she watched the sky, and he, the ground
by Wolfy of the Winds
Summary: And they wondered why their eyes no longer met. Malik's rise from the ashes of a world that thought it could burn her to dust, and Adam's own path off the road others set him upon. (The Smuggler!Malik/Hitman!Adam au no one asked for but I hope you all enjoy! cover by desuex on tumblr)
1. Wings Stolen

A wrinkled business card in her pocket. A burned out VTOL in the streets below. The rush of adrenaline from evading death no less than five times in the last two hours. Faridah Malik was _alive_ in a way that she hadn't ever been before, in a way that her skydives-into-planes couldn't even touch. She'd cheated death and the triad at the same time.

She wonders how else she can steal from death.

A month later she finds herself in Detroit, staring up at the glass skyscrapers in front of her. Two towers joined together at the bottom, standing stark against the daylight sky. The word _Sarif_ standing bold against the glass, the red S drawing her eye. Malik walks in, steps fluidly around the couch in the lobby and right up to the front desk, smiling at the man sitting there.

"Welcome to Sarif Industries. How can I help you?" he asks pleasantly, and Malik notes the neural chip embedded into his scalp.

"I have an appointment with Mr. Sarif," she says, watching in amusement as he does a double-take and scrutinizes her, notes her casual sweater and scarf, tries to identify any augs on her at a glance.

"May I have your name?" He glances down to his computer, likely looking at the meetings calendar.

"Faridah Malik," she answers, glancing around the open and brightly lit lobby.

A moment later he looks back up at her. "The elevator is up the stairs behind me. Top floor, his secretary is expecting you."

She nods her thanks, moves to the elevator and heads up. Frowns. With her job at ArcAir gone, and the VTOL she'd stolen destroyed, she had no plane to her name. If she wanted to fly again, she needed this job. She pulls the crumpled business card out of her pocket, staring at the name. Wonders where she got David Sarif's personal email from. How this card ended up in her flight suit. She would remember meeting David Sarif.

Any further questioning is cut off by the pleasant ding of the elevator as she reaches the top floor. She glances out the expansive windows, at the entirety of Detroit that she could see from there. She wonders what Sarif sees when he looks out these windows – opportunity? The future he promises for augs?

She thinks it's a little too much looking down, and not enough looking out. Not like flying. From a high-rise like this, stationary, it was easy to see how far, how high you'd gotten, and think that was the end of it. Flight was perpetual – you had to keep looking forward. Look where you want to go – down meant a dive straight into unforgiving land or sea.

She wonders just who the great David Sarif is. Does he look down, or up and out?

The secretary is watching her. She is attentive, and Malik idly glances at the clock readout in her HUD. She's still early. Still, she moves away from the window, going up to the desk. Boots clicking softly against the hard marble floors, and she wonders if all the floors were this extravagant, instead of just the lobby and the CEO's. She supposes she'll find out, if she gets hired.

"Here for a meeting?" she asks politely, carefully not looking at her computer. All attention on the guest, a higher level of professionalism than on the ground floor. Malik supposes that's because most people don't make it up this high. Don't make it past the security system – she'd noticed the identifying camera system that was put in place to make sure incoming clients matched who they claimed to be. She assumed it either scanned InfoLink ID's – a dubious, but legal option – or matched facial records with digital footprints.

"Yes. I'm Faridah, I'm supposed to meet Mr. Sarif at 1?" she smiles warmly at the woman. She was applying to be a pilot, and, if it went exceptionally well, to be Sarif's chief pilot. That meant she would be interacting with this woman a lot in the future. She catches herself already thinking of it as certainty. Pulls herself back. Best not to appear too cocky, too sure of herself. Although, she realizes, that might actually work on Sarif. From what she's heard, he's got ego, and sees arrogance as self-assuredness and awareness.

"Ah, yes, he'll be just a moment. If you could just wait here, you can take a seat if you like," the secretary gestures to a plush lounger against the wall. Malik wonders how many have sat there. How many have been kept there waiting, when they could have been invited in. A tactic, which, if used well, made your visitor realize just how little importance they had to you – and how little value you placed in their time. Malik wonders if she's going to experience this. She decides not to sit, moving back to glance out the window. Arms slack behind her, clasped together.

If Sarif will have her, she doesn't see herself in a position to decline. So far, her impressions are fairly positive. The usual security – though it might be higher around more sensitive information, she hasn't actually pushed her welcome. Employees who look happy enough to be there. A lot of augs. She certainly won't be alone in being augmented, and she wonders if all employees have a neural aug. If it's required by the company. ArcAir forced its pilots to get augged – perhaps Sarif will require her to get an upgrade. To fall into line and get Sarif parts. If they were paid for, she doesn't see herself refusing. Her current parts are likely not exactly what they were advertised, considering her boss sent her to a clinic that she _knew_ was a Harvester front. She wouldn't be surprised if she'd been given a gutted chip that only had the same original shell and had all shoddy replacements for the inner parts. At least it worked. At least she wasn't fettered with crippling headaches at random intervals.

"Ma'am, Mr. Sarif is ready to see you," the secretary intones from the desk, drawing Malik from the pondering she'd wandered into. She turns, leaves the cityscape behind, and goes back to the desk. The door clicks, security disengaging, and the secretary stands to hold it for her. Malik would be surprised if the door wasn't automatic, but she supposes this is more of a gesture than a necessity on the secretary's part. She smiles, thanks her, and steps through.

Malik has to pause for a moment to take in the office. It is luxurious. One entire wall taken up by a glass screen, windows across the rest of it. Lamps of various sizes – or perhaps they're art pieces – hanging from the ceiling. The floor beneath is so shiny it seems to be glowing – no, she realizes a moment later, it _is_ illuminated from beneath. There's a large statue that almost looks like _the Thinker_ , with stacks of books piled high at its feet. The statue sits in the corner, between the glass screen and the entire wall of windows. The Sarif logo is painted across the center one, the single wing that is meant to symbolize Sarif's unstoppable progress, to evoke the nostalgia of humanity achieving flight. Malik can empathize.

What surprises her most is how the office appears lived in. She spies a suitcase in the corner, papers scattered over the desk, a robot vacuum dead and far from its charger.

"Faridah Malik, was it?" Sarif asks, turning from the wall-screen he'd been looking at. It has her resume on it. The years she'd worked at ArcAir after college, her university and her involvement in the equestrian clubs – always a hound chasing after the rush, after speed. She's grateful that ArcAir at least looked like a real company, that her time there wasn't a black hole on her resume and personal history. Whether or not Sarif's background checks could see they were a triad-owned shell was a different matter.

"Yes, Mr. Sarif" she answers, moving to stand in front of him. He offers her his right hand to shake. That luxuriously golden augmented arm. She takes it, notes how smoothly it responds when she shakes it, moving almost exactly like a flesh arm would. It catches the light and she has to pull her gaze away.

"Just Sarif is fine," he says, letting go of her hand. He's sharp, she thinks he'd noticed her attention to his arm. She supposes it gets a lot of attention, though perhaps less in the elite circles he carries himself in. "Your email said you could fly anything. I trust you weren't exaggerating?"

"No, sir. If it can get off the ground, I can pilot it." She does not mean to brag. However, she also knows the value of stating her skills without diminishing them, trying to hide them. That did no one any favors in the job market. "Unmanned drones, VTOLs, helicopters, older planes, remote control toys, to name a few I've flown," she adds.

She wonders if he'll ask her to take him on a ride. Mentally debating between showing him her _real_ skills, wild risks and all, or proving she can follow protocol and be a model-perfect pilot. From the read she's gotten on him so far, she thinks he might appreciate the risk-taking more. Would he hire someone like that, though, even if he likes them better?

"Show me," he says, an expansive gesture out the window to the helipad a few floors below. There's a VTOL sitting there, and Malik grins. She loves flying VTOLs. She also wonders just how much he knows about her, if he is trusting her to fly him. Or perhaps he just wants to watch from there as she displays her skills.

"Certainly." She'd come ready to fly. Her hands ache for the controls of a plane, for the lift off ground, the freedom of the skies. It had been a long, long month where she'd had to restart her life without any of her contacts from Hengsha. She hadn't even flown to the US, taking an export ship out on a favor owed.

Sarif steps to his private elevator, and Malik follows. She supposes if she got this far, she'd passed all the checks besides her skill. That she is going to take David Sarif on a joyride means he is all but ready to hire her. The realization helps her put a bit more confidence into her step. If all that was between her and flying again was showing off her piloting skills to a company president, then the job was hers.

They arrive at the helipad and the first thing she does is a quick check of the plane's outer systems. Makes sure the thing is actually in working condition, and that he didn't provide her a pile of scrap pretending to be a bird as a test. The outside looks fine, paint perfectly detailed and not a scratch, lights on and engines idling. She nods to herself, moving to the cockpit without even thinking on it. Notices Sarif watching her, and he nods his approval as she goes to buckle herself in and familiarize herself with the controls. They're similar to those on that Osprey she'd crashed, if by similar she meant the way Latin was similar to ancient Egyptian. Regardless, a few minutes of categorizing controls and memorizing the layout, and she was ready. Sarif was climbing in, taking a seat in the back, lounging. No seatbelt, she notes. He was expecting a calm test, then. She could do that – smooth like a river of glass.

Malik follows procedure to the letter, even calling in clearance from the nearest airport before taking off. Her hands drift over controls that are at once familiar and different. There were only so many changes that could be made to a plane before it stopped being a plane. Malik had flown so many different vehicles over the years that all but the few she'd flown for long stretches of time started to blur together. This one was no different, though she was pleasantly surprised by how nice the controls were, how fluidly the joysticks responded. They felt like they'd been shaped for her hands, despite her usually needing to stretch to fit controls built for men larger than her.

"Do you have many enemies, Sarif?" she asks. Realizes how ominous that question appears, but she trusts that he will follow to the end of her reasoning. It is not as if he can do much else, a couple thousand feet off the ground with her.

"I am the face of a controversial movement," he just says. His tone implies that she should know what this means.

She does.

"Would you like to see my evasive capabilities?" She grins, slow and sly. Maybe there were pilots better than her when it came to following protocol, but _no one_ could out-fly her in battle.

"By all means." She hears the click of the harness engaging, glances over her shoulder to affirm that yes, he has put the safety belts on.

She dives, smiling wide. Enters a spin, and whirls effortlessly out of it and along the glass wall of a skyscraper, less than ten feet from one of her engines. Drops one of the engines below to slide between two buildings, flattening out to fly just over the river. Threads the needle between a ship and the bridge above. Flying far below standard, and living for it. If she wasn't trying to impress someone, she'd be whooping with laughter. She almost is.

When she takes them back to the helipad, David Sarif looks a little less aloof. A little more alive.

"You're hired."


	2. Gift

**A/N:** I've been working on this fic for about a year on ao3, but I was told I should put it up here too for y'all to enjoy!

* * *

Malik finds herself flying Sarif to meetings with other corporate heads for augmentation companies, with legislators, with all sorts of aug-specialists. Sometimes she is sent to pick up clients to meet with him, or with his researchers and engineers. When there are no people to ferry around, she offers to help out delivering shipments and bringing completed augmentations to the LIMB clinics their clients reside at.

It's one such delivery to a LIMB in Denver when she takes off again and notices her dashboard readouts indicating the plane being heavier than it should be with just her in it. Flicks to the bay-camera – she hadn't flown any planes with one before, but Sarif sprang for all the best upgrades. She spots a crate of augmentations, un-opened, and decidedly undelivered. She checks the delivery log, but the LIMB clinic had confirmed receipt of all items. She's already a few states over, can't really turn around without explaining to Sarif and LIMB the extra delay.

She's flying low over Chicago when she passes over a LIMB clinic surrounded by protesters. Wonders what that is about, looping back to check. The fact that she could see the mob from the sky was a testament to just how many of them there were. Pulling up newsfeeds to see what's happening, and the headlines roll down her screen. _Chicago LIMB Clinic Claims Stolen Augmentation Shipment Fourth Week in a Row. Riot Outside Chicago LIMB as Patients Denied Surgery Yet Again. "We Just Aren't Getting Our Shipments" LIMB Clinic Explains._

Well. Wasn't that convenient? She just so happened to have a crate of augmentations that needed disappearing.

Logging a stop in Chicago for refueling, she changed the plane's flight mode with an easy reach above her, stretching up to flick the switch. The engines rotated, faced downward for descent.

By the time she'd landed on the helipad and started putting the plane into standby – she didn't plan on staying long – people in the street were pointing at her and LIMB employees were on the roof. She opened the cockpit straight off, unbuckling her harness and hopping out of the chair.

"What is this?" A woman in a labcoat is rapidly approaching her, an aide rushing behind her, looking frazzled. Actually, all the people on the roof look harried. Exhausted.

Malik wonders how long they'd been here. How long they couldn't leave the clinic from the rioters outside.

"Santa heard you've been losing shipments," she says. "I happen to have an extra box in the back that needs a good home." Box was underselling it.

"You…you do?" The woman looks wary. And hopeful. Malik wonders who's been stealing augs from LIMB, who, though tied to Tai Yong and the traids (at least in China) at least _tried_ to help augs when it could.

Malik reaches back into the plane to flick a switch, opening the bay door. "Free to a good home. It sounds like you need it. They're custom fits, but I figure you'd take anything you can get right about now." Glancing over the edge of the roof at the crowd below.

The woman glances over her shoulder, frowns, chastising the two employees who had just come up to the roof without, it seemed, permission. And then tilts her head at the VTOL, to go get the crate.

"Just like that?" she asks. "No tax benefit form signature?" No matter how many augs this pilot brought, they'd have to be worth a small fortune. Most rich philanthropists liked to write that kind of thing off at the end of the year.

"My only condition is that this is an anonymous donation." Malik very consciously does not look at the SARIF logo emblazoned on her suit. Thankfully the plane didn't have the words painted all over it, so she wouldn't get caught on the news with it. She could have been more careful, could have pulled her flightsuit half off and hidden the SARIF painted down her front, but hindsight was 20/20 and all that. She'd just have to do better in the future.

Huh. The future. She caught herself planning how to do this better the next time. As if stealing from her employer and his clients was a viable career path.

Though…Sarif _could_ afford it. And she was certain that this LIMB clinic was not the only one in dire need of augmentations for patients who _needed_ them, not just wanted them.

"That can be arranged, ma'am," the woman answers, catching Malik's attention. While she'd been considering just how serious she was about continuing down this road, they'd taken the crate out of her VTOL and opened it. They looked impressed with the contents. She didn't even know what was in them, except that they were just one in a shipment of many custom-sized augmentations ready for installation into their rich owners. They hadn't been activated yet, and because they were custom order, Sarif didn't tell the purchasers the serial numbers. Once they were marked delivered, Sarif erased the numbers from his database except to mark them as Sarif products.

Untraceable.

"Great. Well, I gotta run. Do you need a ride out of here?" she asks, glancing again at the street.

"Despite those overzealous demonstrators, there is still work that needs to be done. Thank you for the offer, though, ma'am." The woman waves the two employees to get the crate inside. They jog off to get more help.

"Sure. Hopefully that helped a little." She reaches in again, closing the bay door. The woman waits for her to finish before reaching her hand out.

"Is this going to be a recurring donation?" she asks, a little hopefully. A little desperately. Just how bad is the situation here, Malik wonders? It is nothing like Hengsha, with an illegal chop shop on nearly every corner – here, LIMB does not get the funding it needs, and the illegal modifiers are cracked down on so much more harshly.

"Dunno," Malik answers honestly. Reaching out to shake the woman's hand. She takes it, shaking firm and smiling despite the answer not being what she'd hoped.

"Well, I certainly hope to be seeing you again, Ms. Claus," she says, an exaggerated wink.

Malik laughs warm and moves to settle herself back into the cockpit, firing up the VTOL only after making sure the area was clear. Taking off and stopping to fuel at the nearby airport before carrying on back to Detroit.

Somehow, she doesn't feel burdened. Doesn't feel guilty. She feels light. Wild and free. Teeth on her bottom lip and it reminds her of that night in Hengsha when she'd first died. Dead to the triads and here she is in the states walking down the same path.

The successful smuggle settles over her like a well-worn cloak, warm and familiar. Perhaps it wasn't the triads pushing this upon her. Perhaps they just pulled it from within her.


	3. The Mechanic

**A/N:** bear with me, this is chapter is one I have up for rewriting once the whole fic is done, but I swear it's well worth it 3

* * *

Koller wished that he could feel the spines of the books nestled sweetly on shelves.

He traced the raised names - almost mesmerized by the foil lettering; it was one of his favorites. Something old. Ancient. _Shakespeare._ Heavy hands and heavy words. Thick on his tongue. Clattered behind his teeth whenever he tried to read it outloud but-

He had been getting better; something to focus on.

He walked past _Othello_ and thought of morality.  
He walked past _Macbeth_ and thought about domination. Denomination.  
He walked past _Romeo and Juliet_ and thought about how men used to play every single part in old plays.

\- laughed to himself, ghosting out of the aisle and stalking back to the front desk when he heard the bell of the door.

...and when he peered over the railing,  
there was nobody.  
Tension crawled up his spine for a moment and he had to force himself to _relax_ ; if there was somebody in his store, he doubts they mean any ill will. Most people wandered in to touch history. Papers. Pages. To bitch about how everything was online and off paper. Vaclav Koller didn't have many visitors; many genuine ones to be more specific.

There's almost a burning wish for more customers that just wanted to appreciate good literature. Good fiction. Nonfiction. Poetry. The art of words tangled together to catch. Capture. Weave. Wind. Koller had the uncanny habit of picking something off the shelf and reading for hours on end when not _working_.

This was his world; he rarely left.

He taps metal fingers on wood; _it's loud in the silence_.  
The soft music playing from the computer is hardly a disturbance; swallowed up by the prickling, muted smothering of the pages. Papers. Publishers.

Koller strolls to the other aisles after no initial movement presents itself and attempts to figure out the source of the bell. He smoothes out his flannel - huffing in a momentary annoyance with a sharp edge of his finger snags on the material. He'd have to file it down later.

Faridah Malik was in Prague for a short visit, an errand. She had a stop in the Prekazka district, and decided to take a stroll while she was there - see just how bad it was getting. She was lucky enough that she could pass for a natural at first glance - it would take a police drone scanner to identify her neural chip, and various other upgrades.

The amount of checkpoints she passed was bordering insane - perhaps just for emergencies? There were a lot of roadblocks set up, though none in use, and an even more ridiculous amount of police guarding them. They let her go without trouble - the beanie pulled over her ears and the scarf around her throat were appropriate for the weather and drew no suspicion.

Her wandering found her in a quiet courtyard, dominated mostly by an old, run-down building that was half red, half yellow. A large sign, its letters tilted or mismatched entirely, spelled 'Time Machine Bookshop.' She was curious, walking forward and noticing acutely just how quiet it was. Even the sounds of the city faded to a muffled thump in the background. She stepped under the entrance - an archway of actual paper books, as if the rest of the building didn't drive home the point that this was a bookshop for printed items. A bell chimed softly as she entered, and she peered into the dim, dusty store, saw nobody. Strange - the door was unlocked, and, now that she looked, the windows open.

She walked through the aisles, trying to discern at a glance what each section's genre was meant to be - there were no labels, which she assumed was either because the shop was meant for wandering, or because the owner couldn't be bothered to actually organize the books.

Malik had just picked up _Everyone Loves a Hero...and that's the problem_ when she heard footsteps directly above her, on the second floor. Listened to them - relaxed and heavy, like the person was comfortable in the store. Like they belonged. She supposed this might be someone who worked here - who was supposed to be at the empty front desk, perhaps.

She waited, calm, for the source of the footsteps to make themselves known, and glanced again at the book in her hands. Eighteen years old and garbage romance from the early '10s, it was right up her alley. She loved the ludicrous nature of romance novels from back then, and each book obsessed with trivial problems took her attention off the grim reality she had to face every day as an aug.

The man who appeared on the landing of the stairs looked like he couldn't be any older than his mid-twenties. Messy hair, patchwork vest, eyes so red and lined by dark bags that she could see them from across the store. Arms. Alloy, _augmented_ arms. Worn out in the open, a sleeve torn off his coat. In _Prague_. Malik's grip on the book went suddenly limp, as she was fixated by the person across the shop. Who was so brave to parade their augs in broad daylight anymore, especially in this city?

What did a bookstore employee need so many augs for?

Malik pulled off her beanie and tucked her scarf away before he finished descending to the first floor. She wasn't exactly hidden in the store, though she supposed any person would stand out - it didn't seem like it was very busy often, if ever.

After a sweep of the upper floor (just to be cautious, Vaclav doubted anyone could slip past him so quickly but exceptions could be the death of him) he lets his aching legs carry him down the stairs.

Very consciously - he had retreated momentarily before descent to grab _Othello_ off the shelf, feeling drawn to its pebbled golden lettering. Dog-eared corners. Nothing akin to new - a new book was almost a laughable thought.

Just as new augs were as well.

The steps creaked under his weight and he lived for the sound of it so sharp in the silence; a soft shuffle from a guest nearly lost in the thick of it. It's not hard to find her; and it's painfully obvious that she is very, very far from home. There's something about her - the homesick seems to halo about her.

Her stance is comfortable, but Koller knows the feeling of longing all too well.

"Hello?" the accent was thick on his tongue, "may I help you?"

Formalities.  
Formalities.  
Foregoing, near forgotten.

His little bookstore felt stagnant, static.  
As if moving through the air would tangibly disrupt the atmosphere. Time stood still; the name was fitting - or at least he thought so.

The smile he offered was far warmer than he appeared; his wild hair mussed with the constant pull and catch of anxious fingers and his over coat littered with pins, patches, and particular things that would bid caution.

Vaclav Koller was not a dumb man - he knew that she had to be here searching for something else other than a good book. Especially since the one novel she had seemed to latch on to was from the trashy romance novel section, a place he liked to spend time in when he needed a good smile. When he needed to forget the past. The screams. The cries. Hands on walls on flesh on muscle. Bone. Blood.

He could focus on how some macho masculine cowboy obsessed over some prairie-dog beauty queen. As far as he was concerned, those books were written to serve solely as a distraction for people a little too lonely, and a little too sad.

He could guess that she was both.

"You know," he started and approached slowly, "I haven't exactly read that one yet, so I can't really give any good feedback." there's hesitation, before he shifted his weight into his right leg and pointed at the shelf next to her with his tooled right hand, "but maaan there is one about a cowboy that's so _abysmal_ that it's _fantastic_."

She was so busy staring at his arms - one a hand, the other a three-fingered...tool? - that she didn't actually realize he'd spoken until he was approaching her. Quick-footed, shelving her hundred questions for later (what was a kid like this doing in Prague? Working a bookstore? How did he get all those augs?) she turned to smile. "You think it beats a pilot and some nurse on his plane?"

Her hair stuck up from where she'd pulled off her beanie, no longer hiding the neural chip embedded in her scalp. With the scarf gone, a keen eye would catch the sub-vocalizer on her throat. Making it clear, if he cared to see, that she wasn't a natural - wasn't here to scream and run away because of his augs. That she was like him. And, perhaps, that her staring was not so much out of fear or hate, but awed curiosity. The augs, now that she looked closer, appeared well-tended to. Or, at the very least, they weren't so abused like those of the augs outside, with exposed wiring, errant sparks, rust. His left arm was even painted - suggesting he either had a mechanic who was also an artist, or that his right tool-hand could be changed to hold a paintbrush.

She's finally dragged her gaze up to meet his eyes, and they're even more exhausted than she expected. Red, like this kid hadn't known a good night's sleep in a long time. Like he was kept up by a ceaseless need to escape something - the past, reality, his demons, who knew? He looked like he should not be working today. She wants to ask, bites her tongue on the question. So many questions for one random aug in a city full of them, all hated equally.

"They're all on their own levels, that genre, mm?" he answers instead of disagreeing. His gaze is sharp under the fatigue, catching on the indent in her scalp, the bump on her throat. Subdermals, small and fancy tended to be almost more expensive than entire limbs, especially if they could be made so discreet. She either has plenty of money, or works for someone who does. Which begs the question, what is she doing in Prague? No aug would choose to come here.

Malik decides to not dodge around the topic they're both thinking on. "Where do you find a mechanic in a city like this?" she asks quietly, head tilting toward his arms. To his credit, he doesn't look the least bit surprised at the question.

He ponders it for a moment. Looking her up and down again, evaluating her. "Not many places." Most – those with the money, at least – had picked up shop and left. Others were being… _encouraged_ to abandon their work.

"I need a HUD update," she offers. Cautiously.

"It can't wait until you get home?" He sets _Othello_ down.

"I'll be in Prague fairly often. Better to find a mechanic now than when I really need one." Ideally true, anyway. If she can find a good mechanic here, she could start smuggling parts for them. Especially if Prague continued its descent into the shitter for augs, her services would be sorely needed.

"Well then," Vaclav sticks his tooled hand out. "Nice to meet you. Vaclav Koller, expert augmentation mechanic." Mostly in Chinese black market augs, but he was adaptable, he could learn.

She looks surprised. Or perhaps, not surprised at who Koller is, but that she stumbled upon one of the few mechanics in the city. "Faridah Malik, ace pilot," she says, taking his hand and shaking. An extension of trust, giving him her full name. He could easily look her up and find out she worked for Sarif. If she ended up working with him, he would find out anyway. If she didn't, well. He'd never know what else she did on the side.

"Why don't you come on over to the clinic?" he asks, starting for the stairs.


	4. Icarus

**A/N:** unfortunately doesn't have the extensive tagging system ao3 does, but this is slow burn and here is your proof right here ;)

* * *

Vaclav mentions idly one day that there's a new name in the game. Icarus. "Some sort of assassin-intimidation man," he'd said.

She'd left it at that – she didn't use assassins and she doubted she had anything to worry about from a new name. Anyone who wanted her dead also likely wouldn't go with a new hitman who didn't have any kills under his belt and would instead stick with those already known. Nothing worth paying attention to, really.

Of course, then Icarus had to go and make a name for himself. By killing the underground's top three assassins in one night.

Suddenly everyone was paying attention. Everyone wanted to know who this Icarus was, what work he would do, and how much he wanted in payment. Or _what_ he wanted in payment.

The trouble was that no one could find him. He left no number, no email, made no announcement on the dark web.

A few weeks passed, and the interest slowly began to subside. Until someone found a gold wing sprayed on a wall and followed the point of its feathers and found _him._ He took the offered job, supposedly, and the client said that while he would not describe Icarus, it would be impossible to miss him once you knew him. That the job cost a fortune, _literally_ , and that finding him was the first test to actually hiring him.

Malik was _interested_ , now.

And then she saw the spray. Icarus, one wing pointed down and the other stretched to the sky, and it had so much the same silhouette that the _Sarif logo_ had, that she started to wonder. To worry. Was this a trap set by Sarif to catch her? She'd pulled a huge heist from him and then 'died' in a crash in Hengsha (of course Hengsha, of course again), but Pritchard had called her later and said that Sarif suspected she wasn't dead. Or perhaps that she was, but he'd figured that she was the one who'd stolen literal millions from him. Rather, that she'd helped an individual by the name of Phoenix steal them. Faridah was not tied to any sales or drop-offs or donations of Sarifaugs, but _the Phoenix_ was. She wonders how upset David would be to hear of his designer augs being given to the poorest who needed them, at no cost. That was her contract with every mechanic she worked with – she'd give them the augs for free on the condition that they install them on anyone who needed them, also for free. She switched from LIMB to individual mechanics because, although harder to find and make deals with, she knew LIMB charged for installations and parts no matter how they got them.

Vaclav was one such mechanic of hers, and he was definitely her favorite. She did her best to conceal that fact, just in case anyone ever tried to hurt him to get to her. She'd chosen him because when she'd found him, he was _already_ doing free installations, to the point that he was barely able to feed himself because he still had to _buy the parts_. She immediately signed the deal with him, and told him he could ask a labor fee from those who could afford it so he could still buy food.

He often read her books while she flew long distances, raiding warehouses or making drop-offs to mechanics. Books from his shop, and specifically only those garbage romance books she'd been looking at when she first met him. He'd just finished a chapter of their most recent book when he mentioned the name, and she started looking into it.

She asked Pritchard if he knew anything about an Icarus, if the spray looked at all familiar to him. If it really was Sarif, as she feared.

Francis "cyberhacker extraordinaire" Pritchard couldn't find a thing.

This was either very good – Icarus was totally unaffiliated and picked the icon by chance – or very bad – Sarif knew he'd be looked into and wiped everything. The former was, perhaps, more likely than the latter, but she'd learned to not discredit something just because it was implausible. That kind of thinking got one killed.

So she set out to find him. If he was affiliated with Sarif, better to find out now and, well, try to strike a deal of some sort (she couldn't fight an assassin, not one so apparently skilled). If he wasn't, then maybe she could make use of his skills. There was a mechanic in need of intimidating – she'd heard from a patient that he had charged for one of her augs. All of her augs she stamped with a phoenix feather over the brand name, so if she ever saw it she could ask how much they'd had to pay. The answer had always better be 'nothing' and if that wasn't the case, she asked for the mechanic's name.

A good way to test the waters, if she ever managed to find Icarus.

Her streak of bad luck finally broke when Pritchard called and told her that Icarus' spray had been spotted in Vienna. He gave her the location, and she took off immediately. She'd sold her Sarif plane for a fair amount more than it was worth, on account of her beautiful upkeep of the thing, and bought herself a new, unowned bird. Debated on painting a phoenix onto it, but decided she didn't need to be _that_ extravagant and arrogant. Left it black.

When she got to the wall, face-to-face with that gold spray, glinting in the low light of streetlamps, she wondered how she _was_ supposed to figure out where Icarus was. There were no hints, no clues, nothing but a spray. Closer to one edge of the wall and tilted a little off-center. Maybe she was meant to go down that road? Better to hurry, anyway – she was wearing her Phoenix flightsuit, a black, armored thing she'd had custom-made with a phoenix on the back, the wings spread over the backs of her arms. No need to draw the attention of police, or any overly interested civilians.

A quick jaunt down that road and she spotted something different – a glittering gold spray, like the Icarus one, but this one a drifting feather. Follow the falling feathers, and she'd find Icarus?

The trail led her to an abandoned warehouse nestled in a quiet corner of the city, and she stared up at the building, hands on her hips. Elaborate trap, or new ally? She wouldn't know if she didn't walk in. The question became, did she enter armed and holding her gun and potentially offend a powerful assassin, or did she enter unarmed and peaceful, potentially into the jaws of her own death?

It took her a few moments to decide to just go in unarmed. She'd always been reckless, adrenaline-hungry. The door opened with a clang, dust falling in a cascade as the sound of rusted metal being moved from its longtime home echoed through the cavernous space. She stepped in, let her eyes adjust to that muffling, enveloping darkness. Had she made a mistake? There was no one here.

She stood, listened. For a sound, looked for a light, anything. Just when she was about to turn around and go back to the last feather spray, she thought she heard something. Toward the back of the warehouse, by the staircase. Maybe it was nothing, just a decades-old building settling in the evening. Maybe it was Icarus.

Her brisk footsteps threw puffs of dust into the air, echoed loud in the silence. To the stairs and she walked up them, sure and confident. Best to make a good first impression, if he _was_ here.

She would have missed the fact that there was a second floor at all, the flight of stairs tall and the first floor's ceiling stretching a hundred or more feet up. By the time she got to the top, she was wondering if she'd been misled, been stupid. If Icarus was even real.

Malik was greeted by the light of a small lamp once she reached the last turn of stairs. A lamp. She's surprised to find that this is one of the stranger things she's seen. By the light, she sees a person, sitting on a collapsed support pillar. He – the figure looks male, anyway, though she really shouldn't assume – has his back to her, is wearing a dark jacket of some kind. Ruffled, short hair. Her back straightens as she walks forward, tries to keep the stutter in her step short, keep her surprise subtle and not too obvious.

The figure stands, slow, and turns to her. He'd been sitting so casually with his _back_ to the only entrance. Was he so confident that no one could hurt him?

She's surprised all over again when she sees his face, shadowed heavily by the lamplight behind him, but those are shades on his eyes, golden and opaque. His hands are augmented, though possibly more, and his jacket turns out to in fact be a long trench coat. Heavy boots on his feet, likely steel-toed.

"Icarus?" she asks, keeps her voice confident. He's around half a foot taller than her, and she has to tilt her chin up in the slightest to look him in the eye – well, the shades.

He quirks an eyebrow, she can see _that_ at least, over his shades. Looks…disinterested? She's finding it hard to get a read on him with those damn shades.

"And you are?" his voice is a low rumble, something deep. This surprises her too.

"The Phoenix," she answers. He might be new to this, but even he should know her name, especially if what he's outfitted with is Sarif tech, which it looks like it might be. No one was quite so in love with that deep black and gold scheme as David was.

This gets an actual reaction from him. His shoulders slacken in what must be surprise, his face looking a little less inscrutable, a little less tense. "The Phoenix is a woman?" the question is asked neutrally, despite the obvious reaction in his body language.

The question doesn't irritate Malik – she purposely keeps anyone who doesn't directly work with her assuming that the Phoenix is a man. For one, it makes it a bit easier to make deals, since the underground tends to be disproportionately run by men. For another, it's easier to live in cities where she's hunted if they assume they're looking for a man.

"Yep." He didn't seem to be a fan of overly long statements, from what she'd gathered.

He just looks at her after that. The silence stretches, and she realizes he's waiting for her to speak. She _was_ the one that sought him out, after all. Which, probably, means that he isn't working for Sarif. If he was, the moment she'd said 'phoenix' she should've been dead. Instead, he actually looks…a little more relaxed? Strange.

"You're not…affiliated with Sarif, are you?" she finally asks, shoulders tense. Heart racing, as she wonders, waits.

He snorts, quiet in the dead warehouse. "No."

Her shoulders droop in relief, despite her attempts to suppress the reaction. She found herself trying to be as inscrutable as he was, though for what reason, she wasn't sure.

"Your insignia looks a fair bit like his." She answers, to explain. His brow furrows, and she thinks he might actually be irritated at that?

"Nothing to do with him." The rumble is sharp, this time. Pointed.

She may have hit a nerve. "He fuck you over?" No one knows anything about Icarus. She's not trying to pry, not actively, but she is curious. Few people on this side of the Atlantic Ocean dealt with Sarif in any way beyond his products, and few had any opinion beyond 'charges a shitton'. This looked a fair bit more personal than that.

"Yes." He lifts his augmented hand, makes a tight fist with it. So something had happened, Sarif had done something, had caused him to be augmented? They weren't weapons of choice, she supposed. "Coffee?" he asks, suddenly. She's dragged out of her pondering on exactly what David had done to Icarus, looking at him in mild confusion.

"Sure." He wasn't working for Sarif, he likely hasn't poisoned the drink. Why would he? She's more curious about where he's going to get it – oh. There's a coffee pot next to the lamp, a little machine, and she wants to laugh at the absurdity of it. Icarus in an abandoned warehouse full of graffiti, brought a lamp and a coffee machine while he waited for a job to find him. She almost asks if he brings a book to read, too. There are easier ways to find work, she wants to tell him. She's sure he knows. There must be some reason he does this.

He pulls two cups from behind the machine and pours the coffee into each. Hands her one, and doesn't offer any sweeteners or creamer. She supposes that might have been too much, she would've burst into laughter if he pulled little half-and-half packets from a pocket.

Malik takes it, and sits down on some debris across from him. Now that he's facing the lamp, she can see more of him. A well-defined jaw, some carefully maintained facial hair, his beard a sharp point. A scar through one eyebrow, and a hexagonal indent in his forehead from a neural implant. The shades stay, and she finds herself curious of what's behind them. Wants to know.

"What did Sarif do to you?" if he didn't want to answer, she figures she'd just be stonewalled. Has a feeling that he's good at that.

"Thought if he put enough augs into me, I'd become his bodyguard."

It's the most words she's heard from him yet, and the anger curled tight in his voice isn't disguised.

"He thought you'd become his property," she adds. He nods, realizing she must know Sarif, too. Know the way he thinks of people, of his _assets._

"Why Sarif?" he asks suddenly, taking a sip of his coffee. Clear punctuation that he wasn't going to elaborate further.

She puzzles through that, wondering what he's asking. Why is Sarif such an asshole? Why did he try to own Icarus? Or…why did she steal from him? That's probably the question, she realizes.

A shrug. "Kinda fell into it. First job I found in the States and saw just how much profits he was making off the backs of augs who couldn't afford their upgrades. Who didn't choose alloy limbs." She frowns down into the dark cup of coffee, only glancing up to see Icarus' reaction at the end. "It's fun, I help augs, and it pisses offol' David. What more could I want in a job?" a crooked grin.

Icarus seems…satisfied? With the answer. With her. A small tip of his head, like a nod, before taking another drink. He seems so casual, at ease, and Malik has to consistently remind herself that he's an assassin, a _very successful_ assassin. She doesn't see any guns around, but then he likely doesn't expect trouble when he's just waiting for a client, either. Or he doesn't use them – those arms look lethal enough.

"D'you have a good mechanic?" she asks, before she's even realized what she's said.

He looks up from his cup in surprise. Really, this is not how his usual client meetings go, she's sure. "Most people want to buy a service from me, not sell one."

She laughs, and he wonders how far off-script she's gone. "Not selling. But I bet it's not easy for you to find parts, and if you weren't kidding about Sarif stuffing you, I'm sure you need a lot. I've got mechanics around the world who've got an abundance of Sarif pieces." A shrug. "'Course, they appreciate payment if you can afford it, which, if the rumors are true, you can."

He doesn't confirm or deny it, but she thinks she can see the ghost of a smile on his face, his lip twitching. She'll take that as a victory.

"I'll consider it." Interesting. She's itching to know more about him. It's so rare she finds _interesting_ men in the underground, who aren't on power-trips or made solely of inflated ego. "Did you have a request or were you just wandering around abandoned buildings?"

Request. Not job, not mission, not target. Making it clear that he can decide _not_ to take it if he so chooses.

She shrugs. "My main goal was to see if this was a trap to kill me."

Again with that eyebrow, edging in a neat curve over his shades. "And if it was?"

"Then I'd be dead. But at least I wouldn't be glancing over my shoulder every minute."

He doesn't say anything, stares at her like he can't believe it. She knew she was reckless, but really, this had made sense when she'd calculated all the outcomes. Mostly.

"Not that I don't anyway, but." Taking another drink of the coffee, not so scalding hot now, just barely steaming from the cup in the low light. "Thought that if you were going to kill me, maybe I could buy you into not going to."

Icarus snorts, and she thinks that maybe he doesn't operate like that, highest bidder winning out even in the middle of a job. Most mercenaries she knew of did, and anyone with a fat enough wallet could buy their way back into safety. Of course Icarus would be different – had he followed a single expectation yet? Besides 'infuriatingly mysterious'?

"Not gonna take a hit on someone who hates Sarif like I do." And oh, well that's a relief. Maybe the secondary plan might actually work – she can only imagine how much more good she could do, how much more freely she could operate, with someone like Icarus on her side.

"Can I get that in writing?" she glances up, a bright smile despite the jest.

Icarus laughs.

A low rumble, like his voice, and short, but still. A _laugh_. He's actually a human, not some murder-bot like a few of the descriptions listed him to be.

She's already far too invested and she hasn't even hired him yet. "I've got a mechanic that needs intimidating, if you're interested?"

"What'd they do?" His back straightens, setting the coffee aside. Back to business. She almost misses the softer company, the quiet coffee in the low darkness, with the sounds of the city a dull thump against the walls.

"Charged a patient for an aug install, when that's against contract. He's not allowed to charge anyone who can't afford it for _my_ augs." Hers. Not Sarif's, not anymore. They were Phoenix augs now.

"Sure."

"How much?" She doesn't have money, credits – each heist is budgeted perfectly. She sells enough augs to pay the smugglers who get the items to her mechanics, and the rest of the augs are given to them. Pays off her expenses and has nothing left. He might be amenable to a crate of Sarifaugs, though.

"That network of mechanics you mentioned." A glance at his alloy hands holding his coffee.

She almost asks, 'that's all?' but thinks better of it. "What's your infolink? I'll forward you the locations. Just tell them you're Icarus and they'll let you in."

"Jensen," he answers.

"What?"

"Call me Jensen."

"Malik," she replies. He stands and offers her his hand. She takes it, feels the curve and strange temperature – warmed by the coffee but naturally cool otherwise. Shakes it, and smiles wide at him. He doesn't smile back, but seems…pleased, nonetheless.

She has a feeling she's just made a very powerful friend, indeed.


	5. Wings Clipped

Through the underground's network of information trading and gossip, Malik received word that a new crew had set up shop in Sofia, Bulgaria. They were encroaching on her space, on her operations. She would allow them to remain if they came to heel under her. If they resisted, she'd cut off all their supplies, all their buyers, until they'd either have to acquiesce or leave.

She'd sent them a message, set up a friendly meeting. Their boss had accepted, and told her to show up alone. Vaclav warned her not to. He'd heard chatter about this crew from some of his clients, had told her that it wouldn't go well if she went alone, that these were some of the more sexist ones.

She'd told him that she was used to that, and he insisted, " _Please_ , Mal, hire a bodyguard or something at least." She'd sighed, wondered why he was pushing this so much, and said she'd look into it.

Not that Malik knew any bodyguards. At least, not any that were trustworthy enough to stay loyal to her once paid, and who couldn't be bought off by an interest with a fatter wallet.

The thought reminded her of Jensen, _Icarus_ , who'd made it clear that he wouldn't take a hit on her, and who seemed like the kind who wouldn't switch targets for a higher price mid-hunt. If she had to hire a guard, he might do. He'd done the odd job for her here and there, generally an intimidation of any of her mechanics – and paid for with crates of Sarifaugs delivered straight to him. Even Vaclav had met him, a tune-up on a sticking wrist, at which point he'd talked with her about him the whole flight instead of reading her one of his books. Apparently, Icarus liked him, because he came back more than once, and none of her other mechanics could say the same. He even asked for Vaclav's infolink, which he gave readily. Malik was impressed, to say the least.

So, she called him.

"Jensen?" Casual, checking over her plane and thumbing a spot where the paint had worn away. The meeting was tonight, which might be too short-term for Jensen to agree – but, well. She wasn't sure he'd even entertain the idea. Asking an assassin to be a bodyguard? She was ready for him to laugh.

"Malik." He answers, sounding as affable as ever. "Mechanic?" It's the only reason she calls, after all.

"No, I, uh. Something off-menu, I guess." She finds herself scrubbing at the paint spot, nervous? Why is she nervous? She's used to doing these jobs alone, what does it matter if he says no? Maybe Vaclav's worry had gotten to her.

He remains silent, waiting for her to continue.

"I've got a meeting with a crew boss tomorrow, was wondering if I could buy your service as a bodyguard."

The silence hangs for a moment.

"I don't guard," he answers, a little terse. She can't see his face, wonders if she should have tried to meet him. His expression would be inscrutable too, she's sure.

"I figured you'd say that. Thanks anyway." Quickly hanging up. A rough sigh, scrubbing a hand over her face. Leaving the paint rub and climbing into the cockpit. Might as well get this over with. She pulls her headset on, texts Vaclav that she didn't need a bodyguard, she'd be fine.

Vaclav called immediately, and she ignored it, firing up the jets. This would be no different to any other deal she made on her own.

This crew was surprisingly large for being so new, and had footholds all throughout the city, instead of having one centralized location they were stuck working from. An interesting operation to be sure, and she could see them doing really good business if they agreed to work with her. A big _if_ , depending on who they were. If it was a local Bulgarian heading the crew as Vaclav feared, she'd have a hard time getting them to agree to work for her, particularly if their boss was a man (as most were - sexism wasn't dead in the underground). If it was an outsider, on the other hand, she might run into the issue of them not knowing who she was. Particularly if, far-fetched as it might be, it was an American. She'd run to ground in the United States, left them to other crews. Didn't need her name getting passed around there any more than it might already be. It was a wonder Jensen knew her name at all, excepting his own ties with Sarif.

Malik flies to this meeting with the same confidence she flies to all of her meetings – with a loaded gun and a very delicious offer. None of her clients ever complained that she was short-changing them, or forcing them to work for her through fear. Sure, she coerced some of them through harsh _business tactics_ , but they eventually realized what a good deal she struck.

She started to think that this deal might not be working out exactly the way she'd expected it to – or hoped - when her radar picked up more than one person at the landing site. Clearly they didn't anticipate she would _actually_ come alone, even though she'd said she would. Or that she expected them to do the same in return. She'd extended a miniscule amount of trust and it was already being rebuffed.

She landed the VTOL on the helipad, stepped out into the whipping wind. Her flightsuit, the closest thing to bulletproof that she could fly in, snapped against her legs as she left the side bay door open. A sign that she didn't expect the conversation to take long – and that she had nothing to hide in the plane from whomever she was meeting with.

The leader she was meeting with stepped forward into the light, and she realized it was indeed a large, Bulgarian man. Inwardly cursed her luck, and revises her script. Added a 'my boss wants' to all of the sentences she'd planned to say. This would go over better if he thought she was just a pretty messenger to some man in a distant city. He might be offended the 'boss' didn't come himself, but she might be able to play around it anyway. She'd damn well try, at least.

"I was told you'd be coming alone," she says, pointedly looking at the two crew members behind the man.

"And I was told I'd be meeting with the boss," the man rumbled back. Arms crossed threateningly. Holding no weapons – he didn't need to, with the two behind him armed to the teeth. He was enough of a weapon on his own, too – arms augmented to the shoulders, at least as far as she could see. He wore a bullet-proof vest over his chest, and she spied at least a handful of combat augmentations installed into the oversize arms. They were painted red, no attempt made to pretend they were flesh and bone.

"He couldn't make it. I'm authorized to make deals in his place," she says, crossing her arms too. Mirroring his pose. The way she announces this makes it clear that the 'boss' didn't come for the same reason he did not actually come alone. Neither of them trusted each other. Chest puffed up and making herself as tall as she could – though it was nothing compared to the bear of a man that he was. He towered over her and she just barely had to crane her neck to meet his gaze, eyebrows turned down in what looked like it might be a permanent scowl.

"Your boss lets women arrange trade deals? No wonder he's called the Phoenix – with how often you'd fuck it up, he'd have to keep coming back from the _dead_." The crewmembers behind him don't make any noise, but they look suddenly smug.

She should have called the deal off the moment she realized what kind of person was leading this crew. Should have expected the sexism and known better than to engage.

"If you're not interested in being civil or doing business-"

"Oh, did I _upset_ you? Can you even make deals when you are so prone to _emotion_?" He steps closer to her, crowds her space, and it takes all she has to not instinctively back away and shrink smaller. Making herself a smaller target would only make her vulnerability larger in this man's eyes. She can see the calculating glint in his eyes – he's trying to goad her. Get a reaction out of her.

She doesn't need to play his game. She'll starve them out of Europe.

"Thank you for taking the time to come meet with me. It seems we won't be doing business after all." She's barely finished her sentence when the man's guards are stepping forward. She'd reach to shake his hand but she thinks he might take offense at the _lesser_ sex treating him like an equal. She takes a step to turn and leave, confident they will let her go. That they would not _dare_ hinder her.

Wrong.

As she pivots, she feels them grab her by the arms. She twists neatly, pulls them down as she crouches and throws one off. Spins to punch the other one, and, while he's stunned, pulls her gun. Aims it at the leader.

"Wrong move." Her voice is low, threatening. No one tried to assault the Phoenix and lived to tell the tale.

He didn't balk. Or look worried in the least. The two she'd knocked off start picking themselves up, and she reacts immediately. Buries a bullet in each of their heads. The leader _still_ doesn't look worried. She hears the smooth rustle of glass cloaks disengaging, and realizes she is far more surrounded than her radar had suggested.

She's counting hostiles and trying to plot a path back to her plane when her gun is knocked out of her hand and she barely manages to kick the first one that tries to grab her. They don't gun her down, which implies that they want her to live, or at the very least live long enough for whatever else they are planning. Feels the ring of hostiles closing in on her from her periphery, focus narrowed down to the men closest. Weapons down in an attempt to gab and subdue her – the ones further out may have guns pointed at her. She lands an elbow on the second to approach her, but as he's going down two more step forward. Hands land on her arms and pull them painfully behind her. She kicks off the ground, tries to throw them off. They manage to ride out the jerk and hold her up, so her feet can't find purchase.

The leader steps forward, sticks an arm out, palm open, at one of his men. They hand him a shotgun, and he steps towards her, chest high and casual. Prowling, like a victorious predator come to finish the kill. He's smirking, and Malik strains against the arms that are holding her, pinning hers behind her. Twisting her shoulders, until he's a few inches away from her. He leans down, close enough that she can smell the rank stench of rakia on his breath. Her lip curls, but she refuses to shrink away. To let him think he has her scared. Sometimes, that's the proper strategy – let them think she was a harebrained, emotional, _vulnerable_ woman, and use the underestimation to get the upper hand. With men like this, however, she had to give as good as she got if she ever wanted their respect. Not that she wanted his – as soon as she was out of this she'd wipe them out.

"You don't seem to have too many augs on you," he starts, and she realizes that the long up-and-down he'd given her earlier must have been an attempt to see just how much of an aug she was. She starts to think that perhaps these weren't the regular band of criminals and smugglers she worked with, but something worse.

Harvesters.

"What kind of leader sends a _woman_ to make his deals and doesn't even _upgrade_ her?" He drags the shotgun - which had been pointed at the ground - up, and presses the muzzle against her left thigh. She bites back a tight swallow; her flight suit may be _mostly_ bulletproof, but even it couldn't withstand a blast from a shotgun at point-blank. The only thing that would was police armor or a black market TITAN aug, and she had neither. Couldn't fly in the former and didn't want to install the latter, undeveloped augmentations into herself.

"I don't need to be more metal than flesh to be useful," she bites back. The adrenaline making her stupid.

"Ah, there it is. I wondered if the Phoenix took just anyone in or if they needed the _fire_ to match the wings." He's looking at the patches on her suit, the burning phoenix wings. She realizes he doesn't know that _she_ is the Phoenix. Poor advertising on her part. Perhaps he'd have realized what a mistake this was if he'd known. What this miscalculation would cost him.

"Pity I'm going to extinguish it." He doesn't look saddened by this at all. A feral grin splits his lips, and she tries one last time to throw off the two men holding her still. "Tell your boss to come himself next time. If you get that far."

He pulls the trigger.

The sound is deafening. She chokes on her breath as all of her senses light up – and her vision blackens to compensate. The arms restraining her suddenly are holding her up as her leg- her _leg_ buckles. She realizes the sound she'd heard after the gunshot, a wet thud-

There's agony lancing through her, and she lets out a shuddering moan, breath catching in her throat. She can't inhale- can't hear what anyone's saying, blood rushing through her ears. The pounding overwhelming. She tastes blood. Coppery and sharp, and she tries to pull herself together. Wrenching her eyes open. She wishes she hadn't.

The thud had been her leg. It's lying on the ground. On the _ground_. _Not attached to her._

"Looks like this bird's had its wing clipped." He smirks, smug, and she wants to retch. She's focusing too hard on breathing in, out, as she almost _feels_ the drops of blood splashing against the concrete. Like she can feel herself draining.

"Get her back to her plane. She won't survive the flight back to her boss. Should last just long enough to pass on the message." He's tossing the shotgun to a man, having no need for a weapon any longer. She wasn't a threat. Not like that. "Clean this up." He looks at the limb lying before him. The flightsuit had torn ragged and there was a nice glimpse of bone through all the shredded meat. Blood spills from it and from her, pooling garnet red and glinting in the low light on the concrete. _Such a satisfying sight_ , he thinks. The splatter as she's moved a trophy, a sign of his victory. Pity she didn't have more parts he could take. Could sell. What would it do to the Phoenix, to see his own crew's parts on the market?

Malik feels the arms on her move, shifting to lift her instead of hold her. Feels her leg dragging along the ground as they pull her back to her plane. Thinks she feels both legs dragging. That can't be right.

She's suddenly out of the wind, and realizes they'd put her in the VTOL. They dump her unceremoniously into the pilot's chair, and she's grateful for that at least. They leave – her radar is almost covered in warnings but she sees no bodies in the ship and, by rote, turns the switches on, closing the door. Hands flitting across controls they don't need to see to know. Don't even need to feel. Which is good, considering how distant she feels. If she couldn't see her hands on the controls, she wouldn't be sure they were doing what she wanted them to.

Her HUD is flooded. _Critical limb loss_. No shit. _Warning: Dangerous blood loss. Medical attention required immediately._ She didn't have access to that. As the engines warm up, blasting idle heat to keep them away from her, she bends over to dig out the first aid kit. Immediately regrets it, as the movement rips a new agony through her. She sobs this time, not quite out of hostile territory, but safe enough.

Malik grabs the ribbon in the kit and slides the loop around her leg. Her _stump_ of a leg. Oh god. She lost her leg. She wouldn't be able to fly-

Stops herself. She was a smuggler for aug mechanics. She could get an aug. She just had to live long enough to get back to safety.

Step one, put the tourniquet on. Once it's around the wound she pulls the strap as far as it goes. Secures it and inhales deep. Exhales. Once more. She grabs the rod and starts to twist it, moans as the pressure increases sharply on her leg. Keeps twisting, trying to inhale. One more round, exhale. The bleeding slows. Eventually, it stops.

She clicks the rod into place and lets out a shuddery sob. Hands soaked bloody, and she tries to wipe them off on her flight suit. She won't be needing it anymore after this. Her hands shake. Her normally sure, steady, calm hands _shake._ That's enough to distract her, draw her out of the steps she'd planned out. Watches them tremble against the dashboard, against the controls of a vehicle she knows better than anyone else. Wonders whose hands they are. Had she lost them too? Were they also lying out on a cold helipad, abandoned and mercy to Harvesters? Would she have to get those augged too? Could she even fly with augmented hands? Could they feel like her calloused pilot's hands could? Learn controls on their own, with no input required from her own consciousness?

Malik focuses back on the controls with a snap. Willfully does her best to ignore the fire in her leg. The tremble in her hands. Starts for takeoff and feels the lurch of her VTOL as it takes off. The men had pulled back. Had left. Were they going to follow her, try to find her home? They didn't seem to think she'd survive taking off.

Two calls ring through, and her HUD is so covered in warnings that she doesn't know who is calling. Picks up both of them on accident, hands gripping her controls hard enough that they would have snapped if her arms were augmented.

" _Malik?!-_ "

"Mal-"

She stares ahead. Tries to sift through the warnings in her optics, can't push them to dismiss themselves – _critical bloodloss impending_ – presumably because they were convinced she was dying.

"Yeah?" Tries her best to keep her voice even. Measured. It cracks on the lifted questioning tone, an edge of pain slipping through. She might be going into shock – if not for the fact that she has to focus on flying. Has to _fly herself_ home. Or, to some form of safety anyway. One of her mechanics. The pain has shifted from her thigh to just above, the pressure of the tourniquet digging into her leg and everything below blissfully numb.

"Where _are_ you?" That's Koller, she realizes. She's reached flight altitude, changing modes and waiting the two moments it takes her engines to shift position before pushing them at full throttle towards Prague.

"Bulgaria," she answers, voice tight. Pinpoint focus starting to lose grip. She needs a goal, step one, then another. One motion and then the next. If she has something to look to, it will keep her awake.

"Malik, your vitals spiked and then-" was that _Pritchard_? And was he spying on her vitals? When did he do that?

She just manages a laugh. "I'm-" not fine. Nothing close to fine. "Koller, you got any spare legs lying around?" Reaches, belatedly, to pull her harness straps on. Thinks she might pass out and fall out of her seat if she doesn't.

" _Legs_? Malik what-" the kid's voice pitches shrill and panicked.

"Just the left one," she amends. Glances down at the ruined mess. Pulls her gaze back to the sky, before the glistening blood makes her fixate on it, makes her lose focus on the mission. Fly home. Fly to Koller.

"Did you _lose_ your leg?" Pritchard putting the pieces together. Although, they can't be that difficult to piece together. She should expect more of him. Should expect him to be _faster_. _Smarter_. Then again, she hadn't been all that smart either, had she? Trusted fucking harvesters to uphold a deal. Thought she could even make a deal with them. Stupid. Should have known the moment he hadn't been alone that the deal was scrubbed. That she should have never stepped out of her VTOL and sworn to dismantle them from far away. Too late for that now. Had to look forward. Step one, Koller. Step two…what was step two?

She hums, remembers she'd been asked a question. "The smugglers were not…smugglers," she explains. "Harvesters." She got off lucky, honestly. Harvesters were known for so much worse. They could have tied her down and pulled her neural augs out by force, turning to sell them on the black market.

"- _Malik!"_ She realizes she's drifted when the name snaps her back. That they'd been talking to her. She's zoning out faster than she can zone back in.

"hm?" she realizes her vision is growing fuzzy. Adrenaline stretched thin and she just wants to sleep. She jabs an elbow into her leg, groans at the sudden spike of pain. It works though, wakes her up.

"How long?" Koller's asking her.

"To?" is he asking how long it would take her to fly there? Or how long she has until she passes out from blood loss? One of those might be sooner than the other.

"Until you get here, Mal." He sounds exasperated. Or worried. She can't quite tell. Maybe both? Probably both, knowing him.

"Forty minutes?" a hopeful estimate. If she can manage to make it that far.

"Mal, can I have your position?" Pritchard asks.

She pauses at the question. "Aren't you already in my system?" he'd gotten her vitals somehow, after all.

"Yes. I figured you'd appreciate me asking permission." His voice is carefully dry. No irritation. She thinks he might be trying to tamp down any emotion he's feeling. Or perhaps she's misread, and he really is nothing but inconvenienced by this. That he only worked for her because he lived for the hacking challenges she gave him whenever she made a new enemy.

She's taken too long to respond again. "Sure," she manages once she regains her focus. Thinks that whatever answer she gave wouldn't matter, and he'd be reading the data anyway. Her leg is pulsing where the tourniquet sits, the pain of blood trying to reach the rest of her leg. The leg that her body still thinks is there. The longer the tourniquet is on, the more painful it gets, but she can't afford to take it off.

"Are they following you?" Koller asks, panicked. She faintly hears rummaging in the background. He's probably trying to keep himself busy so he doesn't go out of his mind with worry. He probably will anyway.

"Don't think so." She's finding it harder and harder to stay focused for any stretch of time. Malik wonders if she has any combat alertness pills in her first aid kid. Takes a hand off the controls for a moment to check, dismayed when all she sees is painkillers. The amount of painkillers it would take to actually stop the lancing agony through her would be enough to knock her out. She wouldn't be able to fly straight even if she wasn't lacking a significant amount of blood and body mass. Wonders, for a moment, if she won't be able to handle alcohol as well when she has a new leg. Follows that train for a breath – she'd have less blood, certainly. Less blood meant less fluids for alcohol to diffuse into, so she'd certainly be facing an impairment there. Her ability to outdrink other smugglers was one of her repertoire of skills when it came to setting up deals.

Thankfully she knows her plane's controls inside and out, doesn't need to see them to know where they are as her mind follows threads at random, wandering instead of holding still. Doesn't need to be focused here to fly. To know the feel of buttons and slide controls under her hands, the contours of the joysticks. Texture is blurred from her shaking hands and her sight isn't the best at the moment, hazy and muted. Everything feels like she's experiencing it from a distance, through a layer of muffled cotton. Except the pain. That spikes straight into her core, a sharp fire that makes her breath stutter with each flare.

It sparks a fury that she's surprised to find wakes her up again. She has a new step two. _Call Jensen._ She mutes her calls with Vaclav and Pritchard – knows that if she hung up on them they'd immediately panic and think she'd died.

" _Jensen._ " Immediately, as soon as the line is open. Trying to keep her voice even. Failing.

"Malik?" Is that a shift in tone she hears? Or is she hallucinating? Probably the latter, but he sounds surprised.

"'ve got a _job_ for you." The fury dark in her voice, something to focus on. Thank fuck.

He doesn't protest. She wonders if he knows it's not another bodyguard request. She doesn't ask for anything twice.

"Kill those Harvester fuckers who took my leg." A heavy exhale as she watches a police patrol fly past her, a small blessing.

"What." She can't understand the emotion there, the blood rushing in her ears and the pain flaring high.

"You heard me."

"Are you bleeding now?" He sounds vaguely alarmed. Can he feel alarm? She's never seen him anything but stoic and calm.

" _Jensen._ I'll pay whatever you want." Her hands shaking in their tight clutch of the controls.

"Your life." He finally answers.

This startles her into silence for a moment. Not sure she understands. "What?"

"Get yourself home," can he hear her VTOL engines? How does he know where she is? "And live through this, and we'll call it even."

She sits in silence. That can't be right. Did she ever even connect with him? Maybe she's already dead, or passed out, conjuring whatever might comfort her.

"Any requests?" She thinks she hears a shotgun pump. The sound makes her flinch.

"My leg. Bald fucker, their boss, has it," she can't, can't have anyone else keeping a part of her. Not like that.

"Stay alive for me, and I'll bring it to you." He sounds calm. Calm. She wishes she could feel calm.

"Sure, whatever you like." She doesn't want to tell him the truth, that she might well crash her plane before she ever gets close to home.

"I mean it, Malik."

"Faridah." She answers. If she's going to die anyway, what does it matter if he knows her name?

"Adam," he answers. Quiet. Maybe he thinks she'll die, too.

"Thanks, Adam."

He hangs up.

She unmutes the other two calls, and realizes they've been trying to get her attention.

"'m here, 'm here." Reassuring. Sort of. It's no secret she's close to delirious and a wonder she's flying remotely straight at all.

"How much longer, Mal?" Vaclav, his voice high and sharp.

"Fifteen." A tight swallow. She's almost there. Just a little further. She can do this.

"Hang in there for me. I'll be outside when you get here. Please, Mal."

"Don't worry 'bout me, kid," a huff of breath, startling as the blood-soaked controller slips in her grip. "I'll make it."

She does. Somehow, she does. Sees the lights of Prague and aims instinctively for the courtyard Vaclav lives in. She can fit a VTOL in it on a good day, but she doesn't have the ability to walk from a helipad, and the bookstore's roof can't hold a plane. It would collapse, instantly. So she'll land in the courtyard. It'll be fine.

She only broke one tree with her wing, so she chalks that up to a win. Turning off the engines and popping the cockpit open. Undoing her harness and, by instinct, standing up.

Which, bad idea.

Missing leg, and all.

Her right leg buckles tips her forward and out of the VTOL. Something yelps – oh, that's Vaclav in front of her. He catches her, his chest warm despite the cool alloy of his hands, and that's. All the fighting she can do.

Malik closes her eyes.


	6. Phoenix Reborn

Vaclav managed somehow to drag Malik into his shop without fainting. The sight of that blood-soaked cockpit, controls smeared and a mess of a medkit on the floor – he'd taken it in for an entire second and torn his gaze away as Malik fell into his arms, but it was burned into his memory.

Pritchard was shouting something in his ear, but Vaclav couldn't hear, couldn't focus on it. Mind whirling with the procedure he needed to perform. Whether or not he had the parts on hand – he did, he's sure he did, but maybe the spare leg he had wasn't quite the right size. He shouldn't be performing an augmentation on someone dying, either, but if he waited – she'd lost enough of her leg that if he let it heal he'd have to cut more off to augment it. She wouldn't want that, he knew.

She might not have a choice.

He exhaled a huff and focused first on keeping her alive. No point augmenting a corpse and- and he couldn't think beyond that. He couldn't let her die.

The door left open behind him, light spilling into that dark courtyard, the steam from her plane's cooling engines hissing in the night air. He pulled her over his shoulder, the strength augs in his arms helping so he didn't jostle her.

" _Vaclav_ ," sharp in his ear and he nearly startled so bad he dropped her. He'd forgotten Pritchard was still on the line.

"Y-yes, yes Pritchard?" Taking slow steps up the staircase, only wishing he hadn't put the elevator down on the second floor – though knowing he had to, that it was the safest place for it.

" _Is she still breathing?"_

Vaclav wonders why he asked – he had access to her vitals, he'd been watching them this whole time, but maybe he thinks it's incorrect. Or he wanted Vaclav to verify. He holds his free hand up to her ribs, feels her chest rise shallow. "Yeah, -yes."

"You stay on the line with me, _no matter what_ , and we'll get through this." Pritchard did not often comfort, and that in itself was worrying.

Vaclav made it up to his office, pulling the red book and waiting as the door slid aside. Hitting the switch and closing the bookcase as he waited for the elevator doors to open, sliding in as soon as he could fit without jostling Malik.

It was a harrowing couple of hours before Vaclav was certain she was stable. Laid out on his operating chair and the stump of her leg elevated, wrapped up in some actual clean bandages, and her having not woken up the whole time. Pritchard was in his systems. All of them. The security cameras in his dungeon, his own HUD, and any equipment he had that had the slightest modicum of ability to connect to the internet.

That unwavering presence, the small nuclear hazard icon in the corner of his vision, it actually helped him focus more than he thought it would. Pritchard asked probing questions, pointed him towards whatever he was rooting around for in a panic that he'd forgotten he'd need. He misplaced a single PEDOT implant at one point, and nearly tore out his own hair before Pritchard spotted it with a half-dead security camera in the corner.

He had collapsed in a rolling chair, its wheels a patched parody of what it used to be, but worked well enough. Malik had always badgered him to get a new one. Maybe…maybe he finally would. He had his forehead on his tooled palm, and felt some dry crust rubbing against an eyebrow. Pulled his hand away and saw just how much dried blood covered the dark metal. He was reminded why he painted his augs red, and wondered why he hadn't done so to his palms yet.

He got up, legs wobbly, and moved to the sink to get his augs at least a _little_ cleaner. He felt better, then. Taking a scalpel and sitting next to her to try and pry the deeper chunks of crusted blood out of the cracks of his arms.

Sitting like this, looking over her, he was suddenly reminded of how he had first really fallen in with the Phoenix. When he was irrevocably involved with her, and could not be anything but the Phoenix's mechanic. When OtarBotkoveli came to burn down his book shop for ordering things outside of the Dvali hierarchy. Otar had seen a crate of Sarif pieces that Malik had dropped off, and had demanded to know where he'd gotten it and why Otar hadn't known. Another power-trip, and Vaclav had brushed it off – he'd been threatened and harassed like this many times before. How was he to know that this time was different? He only realized it was truly serious this time when he smelled smoke, when a cold gun barrel was pressed into his forehead.

He didn't even know how it happened, how Malik happened to be close by, how she knew. The loud crash upstairs that made Otar pause, made him face the door. The elevator door opening with a loud ding, all five men in the room turning their guns to it – no one was supposed to come down there.

It was empty.

Only Vaclav, too terrified to turn his head, to move, to remind Otar of his existence, saw the movement in the other entrance. The secret one, that he thought even Otar didn't know about. The black flightsuit with red feathers peeking out over her arms moving slow and careful into the room. A gun in her hands, and she waited until she was close enough to not miss, firing four quick shots to down Otar's goons. They weren't expert shots – only one of them died instantly, the other three collapsed, and Otar whirled to face her. Which was a relief – the gun no longer pointing at Vaclav's head, the slightest freedom. He watched on in fear, too used to being threatened and taking the brunt of it, and now worried for _her_. She didn't know Otar, didn't know how to calm him down.

She was not here to calm him. Her shoulders vibrated tense in _fury_.

"Who the _fuck_ are you?" Otar snarled, chest puffing large in the dark space, his gun pointing at her now.

"I'm the _fucking Phoenix_." She stalked forward, and Vaclav remembered watching in awe and horror, certain he would shoot her. "Who are _you_."

Before he could answer, his face red in fury that she didn't know him – perhaps that was the biggest blow she dealt - she shot him in the thigh. His gun went off, grazed the side of her flightsuit, and she shoved her gun back into its holster on her thigh – that was the last bullet she'd had and she decided she didn't want to bother loading another clip.

He was still reeling from the bullet in his thigh when she lunged forward and kicked it solidly with her boot and sent him to the floor. Whipped out a knife and put a foot to his throat, leaning down over him. The groans of his men as they tried to get themselves together filled the quiet, beyond the muffled crackling of a fire up above. She pressed her foot down harder on him and pulled her gun out again, replacing the clip while still holding her knife and firing another shot into each of the downed men still moving. Vaclav startled at the three loud cracks, sudden and merciless. The fire in her eyes and he wondered what it was. What it meant.

"I've decided I don't care." She ground her foot into his throat so hard that he focused more on getting it _off_ than on trying to attack her. Perhaps she had seen right through him – seen that he was used to threatening behind the safety of a gun, used to threatening already scared people that never backfired on him, that was easy.

"You threatened _my mechanic_ ," she's leaning down closer to him so he can hear the tight tremble in her voice. He tries to sputter an interjection, that Vaclav wasn't _hers_ , that he belonged to the Dvali. She didn't let him. "You thought you could walk in here and do what you _pleased_ because you have some third-rate punks working for you? I should've dealt with you months ago." Vaclav winced at that – he had told her that the Dvali protected him for a small favor – for working for them when they needed him to. She would be furious with him for lying to her.

She kept it short. Slammed her knife into his throat and slashed it hard. Listened to his gurgled whimper as he heaved once more against her foot, and she let him go, stepping off and kicking away his gun. Watching him die slow and choked. She turned and made sure the rest of them wouldn't walk out of there either. Before moving to Vaclav himself and making sure he was unhurt. The fire in her eyes flipped like a switch, something less roaring and blind, something a little closer to what he was used to.

"Mal, I'm-"

"Are you hurt?" she interrupted him, pulling him up off the chair almost gently when he shook his head. "Let's get you to my plane, and then I'm going to make sure your shop doesn't burn entirely down."

She had done that, had strapped him in to the copilot's chair – he was still too much in shock to do much – and had saved far more of his bookstore than he'd thought possible. He'd thought it would all be gone when Otar first told him he was going to punish him. The Phoenix…she'd gone to that much effort to save him, save his home. His livelihood, the one that he loved despite it not making much money at all.

He'd asked why, after he asked how she'd known. She just said 'a certain snake' warned her, and only then did he see the trail one Nucl3ar Snake had made through his systems. As for why, the answer had been that it was her fault he'd gotten into trouble in the first place. It was the least she could do.

Now here he was, looking over her, after her, the way she had done for him those few years ago. She looked so different like this. Smaller not for her injury, but that she was the one being protected. Not saved. She'd saved herself. She'd gotten herself all the way to Koller. Now it was his turn to take care of her.

He'd build her the finest piece of augmentation technology the world had ever seen. Better than his own, and something no one could ever mistake for being unworthy of the Phoenix.

She would have to wait a little, though. He'd implanted the PEDOT sensors into the stump of her leg, but did not want to go through the shock of attaching an augmentation (and one that would only be temporary, at that) while she was already in such a state. Better to have her wait a few weeks for him to make her a custom piece and attach it when she was better healed than to do it now. She could stay here, or he could go with her to wherever she wanted him to until then. His other clients would have to wait.

She came first.

He'd been so busy ruminating, sharp scalpel dug into his arm, that it took Pritchard barking a sharp " _Vaclav_!" to get his attention. The tool sparked sharp as he twisted it suddenly, jerking alert just in time to see the sewer entrance open, and a figure move quickly through it.

He nearly lit his blowtorch, ready to defend Malik fiercely, when he realized it was Icarus. Covered in blood. And carrying a large tank under one arm.


	7. Job Accepted

Vaclav wonders, as Icarus stalks toward him into the dim lights, if he should be getting between him and Faridah. If he is here to kill her, if that look on his face is aimed at her. His shoulders are tense, and where he thought 'covered in blood' he realizes Icarus is actually soaked in it. His coat drips at the hem, the small trail following his footsteps. The tank is- it's a cryo tank. Vaclav catches a glimpse of it, turned to him in the light, and he sees a leg. Her leg.

Icarus actually…stops, when he sees her. Vaclav is halfway blocking his view, and he doesn't realize he's blocking the sight of her missing leg until Icarus pushes him aside, firmly but not harshly, to see. He sets the tank down with a loud thunk, and Vaclav moves to go collect it before thinking better of it. He's still not quite sure what Icarus is here for, why he's here now. He's always called before coming, and even then he limits his visits to once every few months, sporadically. Vaclav wouldn't call him a regular, though he has the feeling that he sees Icarus more often than other mechanics in the Phoenix's network.

"How did this happen?" it's a low growl, and it stops Vaclav short. He's not sure why Icarus is asking him – he probably knows more, looking at him. Vaclav reaches for the cryo tank – a few hours too late to reattach the leg, even if it hadn't been so violently severed. Icarus doesn't react visibly, though Vaclav thinks he is being scrutinized suddenly, more than he was before.

Icarus waits for his answer. Vaclav lifts the cryotank, careful and gentle, and sets it aside on a far counter. Out of the way of any operations, where it can't be knocked over. Vaclav sighs. Maybe Icarus will give him something if he tells him what he knows. The little that he does.

"She was going to negotiate with a crew setting up in Bulgaria. It moved too fast and encroached on her space. I…I thought they might be local Bulgarians. I told her to take a bodyguard. I _told_ her." He reaches for the scalpel and digs into his arm again. Icarus' flat expression seems to sour, the thin line of his lips growing hard and almost a frown. "She didn't listen to me. Said she'd be fine. And then-" a short puff of an exhale. "Then Pr-" maybe Icarus doesn't know who Pritchard is. "A friend patched me into her vitals after they spiked and started falling. We called her and found out she'd lost a leg. She…got herself here. Somehow." He pulls the tool out and waves his arm towards her. "Then this."

Icarus doesn't say anything. His shades are down and Vaclav can't be sure where exactly he's looking, but he would bet his books that it was at Malik. Pritchard is silent in his ear, but still there. He didn't even make a comment about Vaclav almost giving away his identity to (likely) the world's most dangerous assassin. Everything was a little off this evening. Night. Was it still night?

"How…hooow did you get that?" Vaclav points at the tank. That seems to be the best way into asking about what is going on.

Icarus makes him wait for the answer. Looking at Malik, instead. The quiet settles, and Vaclav shifts, restless and unable to sit still, to wait. Always moving, always has been. He could be checking on Malik, he could be drafting her new leg, he could be doing so many things. But Icarus is still, and Vaclav wonders how he can be. He would guess it was indifference, but the blood, the leg, his expression, all those say otherwise. Vaclav isn't stupid. Icarus had never come to him in such a state before, and he'd definitely come directly from some jobs previously.

"She called me and requested I bring it back." He stops there, and Vaclav is left with entirely more questions than he started with. Which…isn't so unusual of Icarus. Finally something he's a little bit used to.

"Did she uh…tell you I'd pay you? What were you promised?" He doesn't know how much Icarus asks for. He's certainly never been _near_ enough money to consider asking Icarus to even punch his old boss.

"She's already paid." He nods at her, as if _that_ answers anything else. Vaclav would throw his hands into the air if he had any energy left. Who knew when she had time to pay – she didn't have any money lying around and he doesn't see Icarus carrying a crate of augs, but whatever. Far be it from him arguing with this assassin.

"Are you, uh…did you want a chair?" Icarus is…almost hovering? He's acting different, not so business-like, not so ready to hurry off and be done with him. "Or uh…shower? I don't have anything in your size but you can at least rinse off-"

"Are you going to augment her?" Icarus interrupts him.

"I…yeah, I mean, I gotta make it first, but yeah." His hands are still on the chair, fingers tapping against the top of it. Restless and so out of his depth here. He knew augs, not people. And least of all Icarus.

"She asked you to?" Icarus is looking at him now, he's certain. He turned his shoulder towards Vaclav to make that extra clear.

"Uh- not to make her one, but her first question when I called was if I had any legs laying around so- so…yeah?"

Icarus seems satisfied with the answer. Vaclav wonders why he asked. It was a very specific thread, and it couldn't have come from nowhere. "I was going to give her a replacement until then but- it's not the right size, and the shock might've…might've killed her, so she's just gonna have to wait." Plus, if she had a leg, wrong size or not, she'd go right back to working, and then she'd really get herself killed. She needed a break.

He doesn't realize he's said that last bit aloud until Icarus moves, glances at her and nods once. Vaclav is about to ask why – why he cares, why he's still here. What he's getting out of this.

Before the words leave his mouth (and before he can think better of asking that), Malik shifts with a noise low in her throat. Both he and Icarus move in synchrony, to her side – Vaclav on the injured one, both because he was closer and he moved just the slightest bit faster.

"Heey, hey, Mal, easy. I'm here." Still uses her nickname, though her first name might get through to her easier. He doesn't know how close she and Icarus actually are, or how much she trusts him. He doesn't think she was _hiding_ anything from him, but everything she's told him thus far never implied that he would go to this length for her.

"V-?" her voice is hoarse, cracked, and her eyes aren't open yet.

Vaclav moves the light he'd been using to operate by so it doesn't shine into her face and reaches for her hand with one of his. "Yeah, it's me. You're safe. You made it home."

"Where…?" her free hand reaches to scrub at her face, and Icarus hasn't moved from her side, watching her but looking a little unsure about what to do.

"My bookshop. You're okay. No one can get you here." A short pause. "Icarus is here too."

Her eyes fly open and she nearly jolts upright before Vaclav's hands catch her and push her back down, gentle but firm. Icarus actually steps back, and Vaclav doesn't spare him a glance to try and figure out why – those shades would stop him from understanding anyway. She still hasn't noticed her missing leg, which is good. Vaclav wants to keep her from that shock until she's at least a little more awake, a little more grounded.

"Icarus?" she turns her head, searching for him, and seems a little startled at his state when her gaze lands on him. She's somewhere between too alert and still far too out of it. At least she doesn't fight Vaclav's restraining hands on her.

"I'm here, Faridah."

Vaclav actually startles at that more than Malik does. He and Pritchard, as far as they knew, were the only ones to know her full name, and that Faridah Malik was the Phoenix. The rest of the world was supposed to think she was dead. Either she told Icarus, or they have some very pressing things to worry about.

She looks at him a moment longer, before dropping her head back. Exhausted, probably. Vaclav is still trying to put the pieces together, and the sounds of furious clacking in his ear tells him that Pritchard is looking into whether or not this is a problem.

"I fulfilled your request." Icarus…shifts. He looks unsettled, suddenly. Despite being the living weapon dripping blood in Vaclav's dungeon, _he_ looks nervous. Or…at least not at ease.

"…Request?" she doesn't even remember. Which, Vaclav realizes, he should have expected. Such a traumatic event and her memory would more than likely be fuzzy between the shot and getting home. She seems confused as to why Icarus is even here.

"You hired me for a job. And you asked me to do one before that." He's actually being…almost gentle with her? He's not gruff, or snapping that she doesn't remember. Vaclav doubts other clients get this much patience and care from him. For Icarus…this speaks volumes. "I completed the latter, and. Will take you up on the former."

Vaclav feels as confused as Malik looks. So at least they're on the same page on this. Icarus glances at him and Vaclav gets the feeling he's not wanted. Which, tough luck, but…he might give them a moment, for Mal's sake. He gestures to the elevator, promises he'll be right back, and heads upstairs to at least close his shop door. Pritchard is still listening, anyway, he's sure. And if he's not, Malik will tell him. Unless she has been hiding things from him until now. That's a worrying thought. He'll deal with it later. He owes her at least that much.

Malik watches Vaclav leave, dazed and…her head feels fuzzy. The hand that he'd been holding a little cool suddenly, despite the fact that he'd been holding it with alloy hands, with what should have been cold metal. It hadn't been – it had been warm and thrumming like he'd been using every aug he'd filled it with just recently before. She hadn't thought to question it – Vaclav was always working on something. But now that she thought about it, she wasn't in his bed, taking a nap. She was in his chair. Was _she_ what he had been working on?

Jensen… _Adam_ interrupts her train of thought. "You asked me to be your bodyguard." There's a frown on his face, she can actually see it, and…that doesn't seem very much like him. Neither frowning (though she supposes if he made any expression, frowning should be the most likely one), not expressing himself in front of her. Any stranger and he'll be flicking his shades off. "I'll do it."

This…really throws her for a loop. She vaguely remembers asking him for his help, for just one job, but he'd said no, and pretty firmly at that. "You said you don't- y'said you don't guard," she answers, confused.

"You didn't tell me what for."

He didn't let her, but she thinks that's not being contested at the moment. "Well-" she did the job. She thinks. She left for it, and she's back here, so the job should be done, right? "I already finished that outing." Icarus should know that, that should be pretty obvious.

"Regardless, you look like you could use the help now."

Malik wonders what that's supposed to mean. She feels fine, more or less. Her head is clearing up but starting to ache. She's a little sore, and a little floaty, but maybe she's just tired. "I can't- afford anything longterm." She'd have to stop giving any augs away entirely just to afford him for a couple hours a day. For one mission she could handle, but for an extended timeframe? She couldn't even dream of it.

"That's fine, Faridah. The only payment I ask is parts when I need them." His voice is strained, gruff and she can't figure out what he's trying to say. He's trying to tell her something, but she's not here enough to grasp it.

"That's…that doesn't add up." Even half-awake like this she can tell that's not right. He…his time and energy were worth far more than that.

"Just, let me do this, okay, 'Mal'?" There's a twist in her nickname, in what Vaclav and all her crews call her, and she decides she'll worry about it later. She's not here enough to argue with an assassin, and maybe this is all a dream anyway. She seems to be having a lot of weird dreams about Icarus lately. Was his name even Adam?

The elevator dings and Icarus steps back again – when had he gotten closer? – and Vaclav walks back in. He doesn't even pretend to be interested in his phone, immediately coming back over to her.

"Heyy, you're still awake. How are you feeling?"

"Like I went base-jumping and hit the target with my face."

Vaclav manages a shaky laugh at that, which, to be fair, is progress. He'd been looking pale and shaken until just then.

"I'll get you something for that. Anything else?" He moves closer, wanting to be at her side when she finally realizes what's missing. He needs to make sure she doesn't hurt herself more.

"Pretty sore 'round my leg," she starts to move, to sit up, and Vaclav stops her. Icarus does too, surprisingly. A black alloy hand on her right shoulder matching his silver and red one on her left.

"Do me a favor Mal, and just lay back a bit."

"Why?"

"You lost your leg on that last job. You came to me half dead and I stabilized you-" she jerks in surprise and he holds her down. "I'm gonna make you a custom aug for it, don't worry. I didn't give you a replacement because I thought the shock might kill you. You're all set up for a new leg when I finish making it though." The last few sentences are all a rush of breath, trying to get it all out before she fights him harder.

She looks between Icarus and Vaclav, and a few things start to come together. Piecemeal, disjointed, but she thinks she might have an idea why Icarus is so bloody, looks so…off. She goes slack under their hands, lays back and closes her eyes. A heavy sigh, and she looks again at Vaclav. Recognizes now that _she_ was the reason he looked so pale.

"Thanks, kid. Sorry for worrying you." Her voice is still raspy, which….probably doesn't do much to comfort him, but. She owes him her life.

His shoulders slump and his hand slides off her shoulder. "Don't do that again, Mal."

She huffs a small noise – amusement? – and closes her eyes again.


	8. Calm

The next time Malik wakes up, she's a little more lucid. And has been moved off of the Chair and onto Vaclav's questionably cleaner bed. A croaked noise dies in her throat before she even bothers to open her eyes, and there's a sudden clatter of noise from not too far.

"Mal?" the thud of footsteps and the edge of the bed sank suddenly. She grumbles again, moving both hands to rub at her eyes.

When she does open them, she sees Vaclav, who looks…more or less as he always does. Like he hasn't slept in days, his hair a ruffled mess from running his hands through it in thought, and that hyper-focused stare on her. Usually she chides him for being irresponsible, for working on something so hard he lets his health fall to the wayside. This time it's her fault. She lets it slide. "Gngh, yeah." A groan, more awake than she would have been if she still lived a civilian life. Less awake than someone who lived even more dangerously than her might be.

"How are you feeling?" His hands hover over her, like he's not sure what to do with them now that she's awake, now that he's not operating. Then, every movement had purpose, had been calculated (mostly, minus the frenzied panic), he'd known what to _do_. Now, he's unsure. He wants to check on her leg but first he needs to make sure she's okay, that she doesn't want to go back to sleep.

"Awful." Her leg aches, _deep_. Like her foot, her calf, all of it is on fire. But, as she lifts her head, she sees the sunken blanket over it, the empty space. It's not there. She _knows_ that, but she can feel the agony in it, her nerve endings alight. " _Fuck_." Her hands ball into fists on their own, and she digs the heels of her palms into her eyes, trying to breathe through it.

Vaclav is already moving to take one of her hands off her face, gently uncurling the tight fist to put some painkillers into her hand. "Let me get you some water for those, and then you can go back to sleep."

Malik normally wouldn't wait for the water, would take them dry, but her throat feels like sandpaper, and she wonders how long she's been asleep. She's still in Vaclav's dungeon, that much is certain. Her back is sore, and all she wants is for the pain to stop. No sooner than she thinks that, Vaclav is back, helping her sit up and handing her a bottle of water, popping it open. She hears the crack of the seal, and that's a comfort – she's not sure she wants to drink any water coming out of his sink. She drinks first to wet her throat a little, takes the two pills, and downs the rest of the bottle.

Vaclav watches her carefully, taking the bottle from her and tossing it aside when he's done. He carefully doesn't glance over his shoulder, where he knows Icarus is sitting, watching. Doesn't want to draw attention to him, or make Malik jostle her leg if, when, she notices him. Icarus hasn't moved or said anything since she woke up, so maybe he's thinking along the same lines. Vaclav might guess he was even asleep, sitting so still, but he doubts the assassin sleeps heavily enough to not wake at the sound of voices.

"You wanna get back to sleep, or can I take a look at your leg?" Vaclav asks. He'd been changing the bandages quickly while she slept to keep them from getting too soaked, but wanted to get a better look at her now while she was awake. It might have been easier to do it while she slept, but he didn't want to wake her to that kind of pain from moving it, no matter how gently.

"Sure, I don't mind." She yawns, winces as she tries to stretch. "How long've I been out?"

Vaclav looks sheepish suddenly – he'd never been good at counting days in his dungeon, and certainly not with a project as important as this one. Plus, his bed was taken. That was as good an excuse as any to not have a consistent sleeping schedule, instead passing out in his chair, head on a tablet whenever he couldn't keep it upright any longer.

"Day and a half since you woke up last," Icarus rumbles from the corner, and Malik's gaze snaps to him. A less forceful reaction than the last time she noticed him, so maybe she's, starting to be a little more herself.

"You're still here?" she sounds surprised, and…maybe she's still a bit in shock. Vaclav isn't really that surprised – this is totally different to when he augmented himself. Of his own free will, with the preparation and warning, it wasn't so difficult – plus, he had replacement limbs right away. Malik's injury was traumatic, and her body still doesn't have a replacement. The phantom pain must be really distracting, on top of everything else.

"Where else would I be?" He sounds surprised by the question, and Vaclav has to wonder if he's joking – is Icarus capable of joking? Vaclav lifts the blanket and moves to unwrap the bandages around Malik's leg, immediately catching her attention and derailing the answer that was on her lips.

She sits up a little straighter, needing to see despite Vaclav suggesting she don't, and he hears Icarus shift behind him too. A small sigh, gently unwrapping the bandages, fingers barely touching her, and she hisses despite that.

"Sorry Mal, I'll be quick." He makes good on that promise, moving a little faster, discarding the spotted bandage and reaching for a new one.

Malik holds her breath as he turns for a new bandage, riveted to the sight. Her leg, gone. In its place, a raw stump, red and angry despite the medicine Vaclav must have used. She wonders if Vaclav had gotten to installing PEDOT implants into her, if she would have been able to see them with her own eyes earlier. She has a thousand questions, wonders where to start.

Vaclav seems to notice this. "What's up?" he asks as he wraps the new bandage around her leg, careful to make sure it's on securely without causing her undue pain.

What's the most important question? "Does anyone know I'm still alive?" The painkillers Vaclav gave her are starting to set in, and she feels her mind clear a little from the haze of pain. They'll tire her out, but until then she might have a few precious minutes without the agony.

"Besides us," Vaclav looks around the room, "and our friend, no. Not…not as far as I know, anyway."

Friend – that must be Pritchard. "Let's keep it that way, at least until the next Gala." No need to bring more attention to herself while she was missing a leg, and it was better for her mechanics to think her dead than know she was alive and wonder where their shipments were. "Are there any rumors that I'm _dead_?" Maybe that would have been the better question to ask. Perhaps no one even noticed that anything happened to her.

"Lots. That crew bragged a bit on the darknet about killing the Phoenix until they…mysteriously went silent." Vaclav looks straight and hard at Icarus after that. He's fairly certain the assassin went and wiped out that whole crew. He wonders how much a job like that would cost. Wonders how Malik paid for it.

"Well, at least that gives me a little breathing room," she sighs, leaning heavy against the wall to her side. If anyone found out she was alive, she'd be easy pickings like this. And even if she wasn't, she'd lose a lot of credibility until she was back on her feet, would have to regain a lot of ground. Easier to hide in the dark for a bit until she could step back into her role. Until then, she'd have to hope her mechanics had some resources saved up to get them through it.

"Can we go somewhere else?" she asks next. Misses _her_ bed, the apartment that doesn't smell like sewers and blood and a metalworking shop.

Icarus and Vaclav _both_ look like they're about to protest and she cuts them off- "one of my safehouses. We can take whatever you want, I just- I take it you don't have a leg for me?"

"No, it wasn't the right size and I figured you'd rather just get the one I make for you straight off. It would be better not to stress your system out and push a temporary aug onto it, anyway." Vaclav explains, still looking uncertain about leaving his home, his workshop.

"I thought as much. I'd rather be in my own bed if I'm going to be stuck in one for a while. And that way I wouldn't have to take up yours." Vaclav would come with her, she hopes. She has a safehouse in Prague with a couple of guest rooms – one of her mechanics had given it to her when he'd left the country for a place a little less cruel.

"How would we even get you there? What if we got spotted, and I need my workshop to make you an aug-" all of the reasons why this is a _really bad idea_ are pouring out of Vaclav's mouth.

"Your clients could show up here at any time," Icarus points out suddenly. Vaclav looks at him in disbelief – and wonders why he expected Icarus to be on his side in this anyway. Or ever. What had given him that impression? The way he'd been watching Malik the past day, almost never moving from his chair, dedicated? "I'm sure at least a handful of them know of the phoenix. If that gets out," he doesn't bother finishing his sentence. Vaclav gets it.

"All of my supplies are here-" it's a weak protest.

"Vaclav, please. I can't spend weeks on this bed, and it's not too far from here." Malik grabs his attention and Vaclav thinks she's about to pout, but she just stares him down.

He throws his hands in the air. "-have I been to this one before?"

She smiles soft at him, and he wonders how she won this one. Maybe he's just going easy on her. "I think so. It's the riverside apartment. The one with the big bay window."

Icarus frowns at that, and Vaclav thinks it strange until he remembers, right, assassin. Probably didn't like windows with large open sightlines. Which makes him wonder again why he sided with Malik on moving – the dungeon was the safest place he knew.

"And your plane?" Vaclav asks. The thing is still parked in the middle of the courtyard – he hadn't been able to force himself to go near it. To look in that still open cockpit, bloody and stained. It couldn't be operated without her infolink signature, and as far as he knew she hadn't been carrying anything, so there was no pressing need for him to go close it up. Unless the police strolled by, which they very well might. He had to wonder why they hadn't yet – surely a passing drone had seen it.

"I flew it while I was dying, kid. I can take it across town." She tries to sound reassuring, but the frown on Vaclav's face tells her that she didn't quite succeed. Maybe she shouldn't joke about almost dying to him just yet. It wasn't the first time for her, though, and while this time was a bit more traumatic, the last involved her plane exploding, so she can't quite muster the appropriate horror. Maybe Vaclav's painkillers have finally set in. She should probably be a little more affected.

"What if I need to operate on you-?" he's running out of reasons besides just a gut feeling that this is a bad idea and the fear of being away from his workshop for too long.

"We'll come back here. You won't have a new leg ready anytime soon, right?" She'd seen Vaclav design parts before, mod existing augs, but never create a new one from scratch. Probably because he hadn't had the access to what he needed to complete such an undertaking.

"I- I mean I won't take long, but all my tools are here and my systems-" it might look slapdash and barely functioning, but he had a lot of tech in here, despite all appearances.

"You don't have to come," Malik offers gently, and there it is. There's no argument he can make for that.

"Fuck, _fine_! Like hell I'm letting you go anywhere I can't keep an eye on you." If he took his eyes off her for long enough he thinks she might go and find another mechanic, get a temporary leg, and go back to work. He wouldn't put it past her. "Just- just let me get my stuff. Take a nap for a bit?" He's seen the exhaustion in her eyes, the only thing keeping her awake was, he supposes, how much she didn't want to sleep in his bed. Or maybe she's worrying about him and where he sleeps. Hell, even where Icarus sleeps. This bookshop is only supposed to house one, and that one is Vaclav.

She smiles crooked, and starts to shift to lay back down. Winces as she instinctively tries to use her non-existent leg to do that. She'd have to stop doing that, at least until she got a new one. She thinks for a moment she should say something to Adam, do something, bring up that it's maybe a little weird that he's just sitting in the corner watching her and is this what having a bodyguard entailed? But she's too tired, and shelves it for later – along with the many other things she needs to talk about with him, like why the _hell_ he agreed to work for her for basically nothing. Malik flips him a thumbs up, her hand outside the blanket for a moment, and just thumps her head down, closing her eyes. Fuck it.

By the time Koller is done packing up all the things he knows he needs for sure, grabbing the parts he thinks he'll need (expensive aug pieces he saved either for Icarus or for desperate moments when he had nothing else), and boarding up his shop just in case they're gone longer than he thinks, it's late evening. He has a pile of crates by the elevator and hesitates. He should probably clean up Malik's VTOL before he loads them in and they go anywhere. He's seen blood before, that's not the problem – it's the fact that it's _her_ blood, that he knows what she was going through, that she almost died, that's what makes it awful. Still, he can do it. Better than her having to fly on that, or have to see it again.

Icarus is still sitting by her. If he's moved, it's been while Vaclav wasn't looking. Pritchard had told him that the reason he was still around was that he'd accepted a job to be Malik's bodyguard. Something about not taking it before. Vaclav considered blaming him for Malik's near-death, but he did come back with her leg and a ton of seeming-evidence that he'd killed all the men who hurt her, so…maybe it was even. Besides, knowing Malik, she probably hadn't actually explained fully why she needed a bodyguard. At least, he hopes that's the case. It's the only thing that would explain why Icarus looked so…distraught is not quite the right word, but he can't think of one better, when he'd first come in.

"I'm gonna load up the plane," he flicks a thumb over his shoulder at the crates, looking at Icarus, certain he has his attention. There's a bucket of cleaning supplies atop them, and Icarus glances at the pile and then at him, nodding once.

When Vaclav gets back, the bucket of supplies in hand – and the VTOL cleaned, despite him nearly throwing up at what was definitely a piece of muscle on the ground – Malik's awake, her hands clasped around her stomach. He nearly panics for a moment, when he hears the sudden growl from it, and can't help but laugh in relief.

She glares at him, goodnaturedly but- "please tell me you have some food, Vaclav."

Icarus raises an eyebrow – she didn't ask _where_ it was, but _if_ he had any. The mechanic was skinny, sure, but he hadn't thought that the kid didn't always have food around. If anything, he'd assumed the takeout boxes he saw whenever he was by meant that he was always eating something.

"I've got some ramen?" he offers, shrugging helplessly. What could he say, he didn't have a kitchen, he just ordered food all the time or ate ready-made stuff he could get for cheap. Good stuff was expensive, and the worse it got for augs the harder it was to find any kind of store that would sell him fresh produce. All those were just excuses – he didn't get anything that involved cooking back when he could, anyway.

"No energy bars or anything?"she's moved to sitting up, her leg hanging over the edge of the bed, breath whooshing through her teeth in an exhale. The painkillers are still working but she can feel the sharp edge of pain starting to bleed through.

"I might have some- hey wait hang on!" he stops his movement towards the fridge instead to stop her from trying to stand. He doesn't even know what she was about to try and prop herself up with, but he wouldn't have been surprised if she just tried to get up. "At least let me get you some crutches-" He was sure he had some lying around – a recent client returned them at a check-up after they'd gotten fully used to their new leg. "Can you just- take it slow, for me?" Almost exasperated. He'd had difficult clients before, but he never expected Malik would be one of them- the kind that always pushes themselves too fast, too hard, tries to get back to their normal too soon. A little…well, a lot like Vaclav did when he gave himself new arms.

"I'll give it a try," she answers, taking the crutches he holds out to her and starting to lever herself up. The right one slides on the floor, caught on some wrapper, and she nearly falls. Icarus is out of his chair in an instant to catch her, and she rights herself at the last moment, his hands stopping an inch away from her arms. She looks up at him, a little startled, confused, and he doesn't move. Malik looks into his shades, wonders if the crease of his eyebrows is concern or annoyance, and raises an eyebrow at him.

He straightens after she's stable for a few more moments, and steps back. "You alright?"

"Fine," she answers, still a little thrown off – more-so now thanks to Adam, and not her leg. "Well, that's a lie. _Starving_." Shooting a glance at Vaclav and he dashes off to find her something. Malik laughs, then. "Who knew I'd be your client one day?"

"You have been for ages, Mal. Or did you forget that I do all your neural updates?" His voice is almost distant, buried in a drawer as he throws bolts around, digging in the back of it. He could swear he had some kind of snack in here-

"Yeah, but you've never augged me," she almost lifts a hand to gesture, but thinks better of it, leaning it back on the crutch grip. Better not to fall, especially in front of the two of them.

"It was bound to happen at some point." Vaclav knew how reckless she was, no matter how much she swore she was being careful. He knew about her midair skydives, leaping out of a plane and then _back into it_ as it fell past her. He makes a small victorious noise as he finds the bar he'd been searching for, about to toss it her way before realizing, and walking it over. He tears open the package in front of her so she doesn't think he'd had it sitting open somewhere, handing it to her.

She leans on the right crutch and takes it with her left hand, tearing into it. "That's fair," she answers, her mouth half full. She wonders if she's being a little too flippant about this, about losing her leg. About having to up her neuropozyne dose now, permanently. She supposes she'd given up worrying about it when she agreed to be augged by a Chinese hack shop in Hengsha just so she could fly for a living, letting them put who-knew-what into her head. She'd asked Vaclav to look it over and make some adjustments to the black box, sure, but she'd given up caring then about what kind of augs she may need someday.

Looks like that choice was for the best. It was just a leg, after all. She didn't need that to fly. Wouldn't have to relearn how to do everything because of it. Just walking, which, simple. She could do that.

The energy bar is gone moments later, and she feels a little better. Finally notices the much-emptier looking workshop. "You're ready to go?" Either Vaclav worked fast, or she slept long. Maybe both.

"More…more or less." He sighs, moving over to his screens and unplugging a tablet, making sure he'd gotten all of his most important systems onto it. Things he would need to design an aug, make sure it worked, make it _beautiful_. He could do it, he knew, and all he really wanted was to sit and work on it for the next twenty hours, nonstop. He couldn't quite, though, still worried about Malik herself. "What did you want to do with your leg?" he asks as he tucks the tablet into his jacket, pointing at the cryotank on a shelf.

She glances at it, and then finds herself unable to look away. Seeing it for the first time was a bit of a shock – _her_ leg, across the room from her. She stuffs the bar wrapper in a pocket- what was she even wearing? A spare pair of Vaclav's shorts, and one of his flannels? It's enough to draw her attention off the tank across the room, even for a moment. She should probably answer him, anyway, before he gets worried. "Bring it." She'd think about it later.

They'd need to get rid of it, that was for sure. She couldn't have that laying around anywhere, didn't trust any of her safehouses to be _that_ secure. She couldn't reattach it, so there was no point in keeping it. But still, it was _her leg_.

Icarus was as inscrutable as ever at that, watching her and not her leg. Would he always be watching her so closely? Is that what she asked for in requesting his services? Why was he willing to go through this? The question clearly wouldn't leave her alone until she asked, but she had a feeling that even if she did, he wouldn't answer fully in front of Vaclav, if he even would alone.

"Let's go, then, before I need to take more drugs that I shouldn't be operating heavy machinery under," she says with a grin. Lighthearted and Vaclav wonders how she can be. She didn't choose to take off her leg, it was _taken_ from her. Maybe that was the only way to cope.

Or maybe she was just excited about a better bed.

Probably the latter, knowing her.

Vaclav waves a hand at the elevator, moving to pick up the tank. He had everything else, and he'd power down the room on their way out. He'd already made sure to shut the sewer entrance earlier. "Can you walk?" An earnest question, even though he knew she'd try to whether or not she could.

"I'll be fine." She starts to hobble her way over to the elevator, using her crutches and swinging her leg in turn. Wincing as she did, and Icarus followed her closely behind, ready to catch her. Vaclav has so many questions - he hopes that at least a fraction of them would be answered at some point.

They take the elevator up, and Vaclav runs to drop off the leg in her plane and get back before she gets to the stairs. He'd rather help her down them than make her walk them on her own, and man, his shop really wasn't that accessible, was it? He'd never really thought of it much before – with augs, anyone who couldn't walk could get new legs and have that ability back. He'd always helped his clients out the door with new limbs, but maybe he ought to see about making an elevator exit on the first floor.

He gets back just as they're starting down the staircase, Icarus with stabilizing arms on her shoulder and back, and Malik with an expression of focus as she works her way down the stairs, unbalanced and awkward with her weight thrown off so drastically. Vaclav moves to give her support on the other side, and she huffs a sigh in annoyance at needing it, but they make their way down faster because of it. "Thanks," she says at the bottom, glancing at both of them. Vaclav waves her off.

She gets to the VTOL and seems surprised to see it clean. And unconfiscated, for that matter. She'd expected the police would have taken some kind of action by now. Maybe she'd have to call Pritchard and asked if he'd had anything to do with it. The answer probably being yes. She glances at Vaclav, an eyebrow raised, and he just shrugs. A soft smile and she moves to lift herself in, putting one crutch up at an awkward angle.

"Wait-" Vaclav is jumping in to help pull her up before she actually eats it trying to get in herself. She wasn't going to ask for help, but at least she wouldn't refuse it either. That was something. He takes the crutch from her and gives her his hand instead, and with Icarus helping from outside, they get her into the plane without too much of a grimace on her face. She drops into her seat with a sigh, head leaning back and she just breathes for a minute.

"Take your time, Mal, we're not in a hurry." It was still night, and Vaclav had to shut everything down. He runs back to the shop to turn on his security, close everything, and make sure he hadn't forgotten anything important (he probably had).

She sighs, closing her eyes, listening to the sounds of the city, breathing in the crisp night air. Adam puts her crutches aside in the back of the plane, and only when he puts a hand on the shoulder of her chair does she open her eyes again.

"Are you okay?" he asks. That's certainly one hell of a question.

"More or less. Did you have to go through this when you got augged?" He'd told her of his augging like it was less than peaceful, and maybe she shouldn't be asking, but she was curious.

"No." He's silent for a little after that. "When I woke up, I'd already been augmented." He looks at his other hand, curling it slow and loosening it, listening to the sounds it made, noises he'd had to grow quickly accustomed to. Mechanical.

She wonders if he'd been in a coma. If he'd been kept under. Or if he'd been augmented in such a desperate hurry that he wouldn't have had a chance to wake up anyway. She wonders if she wants to know.

"Well, at least you didn't have to hobble around like I do now," she offers.

He exhales shortly, something close to a noise of amusement. Another success, and she really needs to start writing these down. "Won't be for long."

"Already feels like forever. At least I can still fly." She reaches for the controls, starts up her plane and listens to the engines thrum awake. At home. This was where she belonged, just resting her hands on her clean, unbloodied dashboard. She'd figure out why they tried to kill her, she'd figure out who had set up that crew, and she'd get back at them all by expanding more.

They couldn't keep the Phoenix down for long. Whoever 'they' were.


	9. Respite

They get to the apartment, and Vaclav sees that it could only be called an apartment in the sense that its walls were connected to the buildings next to it. Beyond that, it was its own house, looking over the river. He wonders where she got this place from, figures he'll ask on the walk in. It has a large garden with high walls, and that can't have been in the original plans, because all of the other buildings don't. She steers the VTOL over the building and descends straight into the yard.

"I did have to do a _little_ remodeling to make this a place I could use," she laughs, landing smoothly and reaching above to shut off the engines. She tilts her head, sends a command over her infolink, and just like she'd pressed a garage door button, the high walls of the garden start to move, closing over the plane. He realizes the analogy was more correct than initially expected – this _was_ a garage, just one made for planes.

"Mal, what-" he's not even sure what he's going to ask. When did she build a garage? It doesn't quite make the place inconspicuous, but he supposes it is better than just leaving a VTOL on the lawn.

She grins at him, her eyes sparking delight, and he's glad at least to see her a little more herself. "I can't give you all my secrets. What would keep me interesting then?"

"The bad books, probably." He unclips his harness as the plane shuts down, standing. Notices that Icarus had not taken his eyes off her the whole time she'd been flying, as if he had been watching for her to pass out and preparing to take over. Could he fly a plane? Vaclav wouldn't put it past him.

Malik snorts, unclipping herself but remembering this time to not immediately try standing. She'd wait for one of them to bring the crutches they'd stolen from her. She turns halfway in her seat, careful not to shift her leg, and hears Vaclav standing. Before he can get over to her, Icarus walks past.

"Wait here," he rumbles softly and steps out of the plane soundlessly. Malik wonders if he'd seen something, noting his alert posture and careful movements, or if this was just his usual caution. Maybe he did this to any place he visited that hadn't been occupied in a while. It was a good instinct, she thought. One born out of needing it.

Vaclav steps up and hands her the crutches, looking out after Icarus as he moves from the garage toward the house. She tells the security system to unlock the door for him, nodding when his head whips back to check and see if she'd done it. Vaclav helps her stand and settle onto the support of the crutches, and she still has to focus on just that. She'd broken her leg many times riding horses in college, but at least then she'd still had the _weight_ of it to swing around and keep her balanced. Now there was just…nothing. _Temporary_ , she reminds herself. It won't be like this forever.

Icarus vanishes into the house and she and Vaclav exchange glances. He shrugs, and she makes a similar expression. She has to remember that she can't be standing and expressive with her hands or else she'll end up on the ground, and no one wanted that.

By the time Icarus returns, Vaclav's helped her out of the plane, and the assassin frowns like he's about to say something about it – perhaps something about how if there _was_ a danger, she would've had a hard time getting back in the plane to escape – but keeps quiet. "All clear," he says instead.

"I'm so ready for my bed and a kitchen," she says eagerly, already starting to hobble towards the house. Vaclav is torn between the cargo and her for an instant, before running after her to be on standby, just in case. "Icarus, please tell me you can cook, because _that one_ is useless," she teases, tossing a grin over her shoulder as she makes her slow way across the garage.

The assassin doesn't answer for a suspicious amount of time, and Vaclav raises an eyebrow at him.

"I get by," Icarus finally responds, and Vaclav laughs suddenly.

"Looks like he can't cook either, Mal! You're fresh out of luck," he's grinning, a hand on her back to help her remain stable. In the back of his mind, he thinks she was right – she did need to get out of his dungeon, maybe they all did. The site of almost losing her, and the reminder of how close he'd come to being alone again.

"Useless," she laughs. "I'll make something after I nap I guess." They'd need groceries, but she'd make one of them deal with it. Malik wasn't a star cook, but she could make something delicious out of whatever was in the kitchen, and she took pride in that skill.

Vaclav hops ahead of her to open the door and hold it to give her room to get through. "Give me a list and I'll go to the store," he offers, because he very much loves Malik's 'any-and-everything' omelettes. A specified list defied the purpose of her kitchen scrap breakfasts, but they would be here awhile, and she wouldn't make only omelettes for them. Vaclav also very much planned on ordering takeout for dinner – it might have been 3AM but he still hadn't eaten his third meal…or his second for that matter – once he got Malik situated. If he picked the right thing, it would make good breakfast leftovers too, so she could take it easy for a bit.

She gets in, and Vaclav holds the door for Icarus too, before moving to help her through the house. Though, if he was being honest, he had no idea where anything was, reaching blindly for a light switch in the dark and wondering why Icarus hadn't turned any of the lights on. He had those fancy aug eyes, sure, but once he was certain the house was empty he could have done them a favor. Vaclav finds it suddenly, with a quiet aha- and realizes he'd found Icarus' hand as the black alloy flicks up and the room is illuminated suddenly. The assassin has an eyebrow quirked in…amusement? Is that what that is?

"I want to take a shower. Or a bath. Whatever. _Something_." She wasn't sure what would be better for her leg – Vaclav most likely wouldn't want her to soak it, but she couldn't stand long enough to shower and manage to keep the leg out of water. She needed it, though, could still feel dried blood crust in her skin. Someone – Vaclav, probably – had wiped off the actual blood, but she felt it like it was just under her skin ,and the only thing that would help was hot water and soap.

"Mal-"

"I don't care if you need to find a showercap and rubberband it to my leg. I feel gross." And she sure as fuck didn't want to get into a clean bed with brand new sheets as she was now. Especially one she'd be spending a while in. Malik rarely stopped moving for more than a week – this was going to be rough, if only for missing flying. She'd done it for longer though, she reminds herself. Back in Hengsha, she didn't even go _near_ a plane for a month. This would be fine.

"Alright, alright, we'll figure something out. Just gimme a sec," Vaclav placates, and helps Malik onto the couch. "Let me just find something and get a bath started, okay?" His hands up like he's surrendering, begging her to just _give him a second_. She laughs.

"Okayyy, fine. Thanks, kid," smiling up at him as she leans back against the couch.

Icarus makes no move to follow Vaclav or offer to help move those crates in, and he wonders if the assassin is looking for the best corner to put a chair in. He leaves him to it, not quite comfortable around him in any sense besides the ones when he comes in for a repair, and even that was treading on thin ice. He sure wasn't going to piss off a deadly weapon just for some help carrying in a few boxes, especially when he had strength augs of his own.

"You know, you don't have to be on guard _all_ the time," Malik offers quietly once Vaclav is back outside. Adam turns to her, one eyebrow neatly curved over the top of his shades. She wonders if he'd practiced that in the mirror, making sure he conveys exactly how much he wants to. Which is, apparently, _not a lot_.

"That's the job," he explains, as if she didn't understand what a bodyguard was meant to do.

"I'm not going to die if you look away for a minute," she answers, a short laugh. He doesn't answer, which makes her think that he maybe doesn't agree with that sentiment. "I promise," a little more firm this time, "I'm already not paying you what your time is worth – just…take it a little easier."

His shoulders stiffen, and she thinks maybe she's offended him. _Shit_. He looks even _less_ relaxed than before, which was the exact opposite response she wanted.

"That's not what I mean-" a huff of annoyance. She hated this. Hated being helpless. "I appreciate you being here but. I'm not going to wilt like some rose whose soil is just barely too acidic." She can't stop thinking about how adamant, how close, how ready he'd been to catch her the first time she tried to stand. Vaclav too, but she knew that was out of worry – she wasn't quite sure why Adam was so…invested, too. "You can relax, too."

Adam opens his mouth like he's about to disagree, and pauses.

"It would make it easier on _me_ ," she offers, hoping that giving him an out would help him loosen up a _little_. She might go crazy if he insists on sitting in her room while she sleeps and not using the third guest bedroom which most certainly exists in this house.

"You asked me to be your bodyguard, not to make your life easier." There's the slightest curl in the corner of his lips as he says that, and Malik snorts.

"Fair, you've got me there." She's smiling now, at least. "I would appreciate it, though." She leaves it at that. Any harder a push and it might be too much.

He lets out a short sigh, shoulders dropping, and she thinks that might be acquiescence. Either she's gotten good at getting things out of men, or both Adam _and_ Vaclav are going easy on her.

Vaclav walks back in with an open box, dropping it by the door and looking like he was about to go somewhere before pausing. "Which way is your room, Mal?" he asks suddenly.

Malik laughs, and Icarus looks…well, a little less standoffish than he had earlier. Vaclav's not sure what changed.

"The one with the river view. Down the hall and to the left," she answers. Pointing helpfully. The house had two rooms on one side, and one on the other with a connected office, which just happened to have been converted into a mechanic's shop. She was just waiting for Vaclav to see it. He'd probably notice while she was in the bath, and she'd be able to hear him from across the house.

He flashes her a thumbs up and takes the box down that way.

She hears the sound of running water and reaches for the crutches. Adam is there before she can get to them, handing them to her and helping her stand. "Thanks," she smiles soft. No point in being sullen about it, and it wouldn't be like this for long. Especially if Adam blamed himself for the loss of her leg, which she thought he might.

By the time she gets to her room, the bath is full and Vaclav is waving a piece of…something that almost looks like a swimcap at her, and what could have been one of his suspenders in his other. She snorts, and reaches to take them. "Thanks, kid." Tucking the two items in the pocket of her shorts and heading for the bath. He looks like he's about to follow, but she just glances over her shoulder. "I've got this. You'll hear an undignified yelp if I don't," a short laugh and really, she just needs some time alone. A little bit to remember she was still the Phoenix, still a powerful player in the underground. And perhaps to start thinking about her return.

She closes the bathroom door – doesn't lock it, just in case one of them decide to force their way in, she'd rather still have a functioning door at the end of it – and sits on the edge of the bathtub to undress. It's a pain, but she focuses on the sweet reward at the end of it, covering the bandages on her leg and tightening the plastic over it with the strap Vaclav had given her.

She lowers herself into the warm water and nearly _whimpers_ at how good it feels. Instantly relaxing and leaning her head back against the cushion on one end of the tub, and she doesn't even start scrubbing like she'd planned to. It feels too good, and she smells a sweet floral scent – Valcav must have found the bath salts. She's impressed he didn't overdo it.

Her leg aches, but it's soothed a little in the warm water, and she just relaxes with her eyes closed for a while. She could almost fall asleep, but she doubts Vaclav would let her get away with that. She'll take however long she gets, feeling the muscles in her back start to loosen from their tight soreness.

Idly, she thinks over her situation. No one knew she was alive, and once her mechanics stopped getting shipments, they'd start to think that the rumors they'd heard were true. New rumors would spring up of her death, and some groups might scramble to try and take over her areas. She'd have to recover faster than they could organize to do that, and she had to hope that her crews were loyal enough to not give up on her so easily, without any kind of proof.

Maybe the best way for her to come back would be the next Gala. She hadn't been to one yet this year, but the winter one was coming up in a few months, and she should be well enough adjusted by then, while not taking too long and leaving all those who relied on her high and dry. Not that three months was anywhere near enough to adjust to a new aug, but if Adam stayed like he said he would, she thinks she can manage it. And where else could she prove just how _unkillable_ the Phoenix was? That they had better just give up.

She's smiling to herself, already itching for the day she'll walk again, and then when she can get back to work. Back to stealing and flying and helping people. She wonders if Adam will stay then, too. If he will continue working for her or if, as he'd said 'she looked like she needed the help now,' and he'd leave when she was back on her feet, literally.

That particular thought is interrupted by a distant shriek on the other end of the house and Malik snorts. Vaclav found the workshop, she's betting. She hears him calling and doesn't answer his questions, just laughing loud enough for him to hear that she was still awake. She hears Adam's gruff rumble too, and wonders if the assassin had been startled, had thought there was a threat. Somehow she wouldn't be surprised. Maybe the time she had to spend cooped up would pass faster than she thought.

It does take Malik a while to settle into this sedentary lifestyle, where she moves little – generally just walking from her room to the living room to sit in the bay window and drink in the sun over the river – and is never alone. Vaclav is constantly holed up in his room or the workshop when he's not checking on her, and Adam is always in the same room she is, save for when she sleeps and he takes the empty room. She'd nearly had to beg him to, but she put her foot down and started to drag the only chair in her room out when he'd made a move to sit in it. That had been too much, even for her. His expression had been an entertaining one, though, the panic as she threatened to hurt herself over this argument and his annoyance at being rebuffed so.

They had settled though, and Vaclav had started to learn how to cook, if only because the first few times she tried it she nearly fell with a cooking knife in her hands. So she directed while he did his best, and at least the food came out edible...mostly. Adam had even grumbled that engine oil would taste better once, and that was…that must have been a joke. Malik had laughed, surprised, and Vaclav couldn't help himself from joining in on that too. The steely reserved assassin had a sense of humor.

It's not until Malik's leg is nearly healed that Vaclav suddenly brings up a topic he hadn't mentioned in a while. "Mal, have you thought about what you want to do with your leg?" A glance over his shoulder to the cryotank in her room, as if she could have possibly forgotten which leg he was talking about.

She hums, looking out the window as he changes the bandages – she was perfectly capable of doing it, but she let him because he would do it again anyway after – and doesn't answer for a moment. "Well, we've gotta get rid of it, don't we?" She moved around too much for any one place to be safe for it, and even if there was one, she wouldn't quite be comfortable leaving it behind. Best to just be done with it, perhaps.

"You don't _have_ to, it'll last in that tank for…basically forever if it's not broken, but that might be a good idea. You know DNA tech isn't anything new, and who knows what could be done with a whole limb? Who knows, they might even make a clone of you," he jests, eyebrows waggling, and Malik snorts.

"They're not that far along yet, kid. I guess we could incinerate it, but that's kind of boring." She's looking back down, now, at the empty spot where her leg should have been.

"Could always give it a Viking funeral," Vaclav laughs, pointing out at the water. Malik laughs, but a little less like she's along for the joke and maybe more like she's taking it seriously.

"But I don't have a bow or flaming arrows," she points out, leaning her cheek on her hand.

"Grenade launcher," Adam joins in from his usual perch, and Vaclav jerks in surprise, a startled laugh escaping him.

"You too?" he asks, letting go of Malik's leg, finished with checking it over.

"I don't have one of those either, Icarus," Malik points out.

"I do," the assassin answers, as if that should have been obvious. Well…to be fair, it really should have been. But where? Vaclav had never seen any kind of large weapons on the scale of a grenade launcher around. Just small firearms for the most part, and he knew that the assassin was weapon enough on his own, just based on his extensive augmentations.

"Are you two being serious?" Vaclav almost squeaks. He thought they were playing this _undercover_ mostly, and setting fire to something in a river with a _grenade launcher_ was just begging to be found out.

"Yeah why not?" Malik answers flippantly, but Vaclav can see the spark in her eyes that is just begging to _do something_ , to go out and he'd call it itchy trigger fingers if she was more of the gun type.

The mechanic sighs, giving up. "As long as we don't do it _right next to your house_." Which only seems to make Malik look more eager, and he really should have realized that when he's known how much she wants to get out and go back to her smuggling career.

"We're going to need a little wooden boat, a grenade launcher, and a few grenades." Like hell if she was letting anyone but her blow up her leg, but she…also might miss once or twice.

Vaclav pinches the bridge of his nose, and Icarus rumbles out a _laugh_. Any stranger and Malik would start walking on a spectral leg. He throws his hands up in the air and goes back to his workshop, and his schematics for her new leg, where things _made sense_.

A few days later, Icarus comes home – he'd left? When had he left? – with a small _boat_ in his hands, and Vaclav can't believe this is actually happening. Malik claps her hands with glee when she sees, setting down the book she'd been reading and grinning. If she was going to never see her leg again, it had better be in some flashy explosion, and what better way than losing it to the ocean? If _she_ ever went, she'd want it to be flashy.

It was all symbolism, really. A phoenix burned by fire would only rise stronger and renewed, and she was going to do just that. No matter how many tried to kill her, she would keep doing what she did and helping augs who couldn't afford to survive without it. She wouldn't let greedy bastards like the ones in Bulgaria make money off the backs of those who just wanted to live.

The sun was setting, and she looks far too excited to even consider winding down for the day. "Are we going now?"

Icarus looks amused – he's started doing that more lately, and Vaclav wonders what's happening. What has happened. Is there something he's missing in the hours he spends in the workshop, starting to build her leg? Or is Icarus just settling into a long job and figuring he may as well seem more human to his client. Maybe it's both. Maybe neither. Vaclav gives up on the thought shortly after starting it – any train that involved trying to figure out Icarus wasn't worth its while, mainly because it always hit a dead end sooner or later.

"We can," the assassin answers, and Vaclav groans.

"And how, precisely, are we going to get there? We can't just fly in and out of here and expect to not be noticed again," he points out. Since when had _Vaclav Koller_ become the voice of reason? Is this what Malik had done to him? Made herself so reckless that _he_ had to step up so that she didn't get herself killed?

"Taxis exist," Malik responds, and he sighs. She's been looking forward to this for days, and he doesn't have it in him to keep it from her any longer, especially when he had brought it up in the first place.

"Alright, alright, I'll call one while you get ready. Icarus, you bring kerosene?" If they're going to do this, they're going to do it properly if Vaclav has any say over it. The assassin raises a single eyebrow at him, and Vaclav takes that to mean ' _yes of course I do_.'

Malik couldn't even wait to get her new leg to do this, but maybe it'll quell the itch to go out in her until he's able to finish the leg. He's been working at it constantly, barely sleeping, and it shows. Malik yelled at him once for it, but he wants to be done, wants her to have her leg back. And she couldn't stop him, anyway.

He grabs the cryotank with her leg in it while Icarus puts an actual, honest-to-god _grenade launcher_ in the little boat, holding it to his chest in a way that concealed the weapon easily. Christ. Vaclav wants to ask where he got the weapon, but at the same time he thinks that maybe he doesn't want to actually know.

There's a taxi waiting for them when they get outside of the garage-hangar, and Icarus puts the items in the trunk before the cabby can think of reconsidering at the sight of so many augs. Vaclav puts the leg in too, and quickly climbs into the back seat to help Malik in. Adam gets in front, looking closely at the driver before instructing him to the docks nearby, where the river was widest. The driver looks worried, but doesn't say anything, just turning on the radio before driving where he was told.  
-

The taxi leaves them by a quiet dock near where the river was widest, looking suspiciously but not saying anything once he was paid, eager to leave them behind for more _natural_ clients. Malik hobbled down the slope behind Adam, leaning on Vaclav to take the steps down to the water, and _oh_ the fresh air is crisp in her lungs, sweet and sharp. She missed skydiving suddenly. The burn of night air against her cheeks, the lights of a city below.

This was a good taste, at least.

Adam lowers the little boat into the water soundlessly, and she wonders where he even got it. Maybe she'll ask him when they get back home. She reflects for a moment on how strange it is that she accustomed to him in her life daily so quickly. Faridah Malik, the Phoenix who took care of herself and always had, growing used to and more or less _welcoming_ another person into her life? Unthinkable to any not in her circle, and bizarre even to Vaclav and Pritchard. Perhaps Pritchard less so. He'd gone mysteriously silent once Malik had stabilized, which wasn't all _that_ unusual from him except that he'd actually warned them this time. Still, she knew he'd call if he needed her help. Hopefully, anyway.

Vaclav runs back up the steps to grab the leg once she's down by the water, and she lowers herself to sit on the dock, one foot trailing just a hair's breadth above the water. The assassin poured kerosene into the little wooden craft as he held it from drifting, and she had a moment of startled clarity, that they were really _doing this_. The fact that she paused to reflect on that was probably a little more telling than if she had just barged forward without stopping to think twice.

The mechanic hands her the tank, letting this be _her_ choice. She knows there's no more fun way to do this, though, and pops the seal open, the hiss of freezing air meeting the chilly but far warmer night. She opens the hatch and dumps her leg right into the boat. She hefts the tank off to the side – if anything, that was an expensive item she'd taken from…whoever.

"Is this where I'm supposed to say a word of farewell? Or is that after the explosions?"

"Traditionally, there aren't _explosions_ , Mal, just a long bonfire." Vaclav answers, holding the other end of the boat as Icarus hands Malik the weapon.

"Did you bring any duds?" she asks, looking up at him, his black coat blending in with the night, as dark as the sky above in such an illuminated city. "I mean, I _might_ get it in one, but I'd rather not blow up the river if I don't." She also very much wanted to land it in one.

"you're asking me if I have any grenade-shaped rocks," Icarus deadpans back to her, and both Malik and Vaclav snort.

"Yeah, basically."

"No, ' _Mal_ ', I did not." There's that twist on her name again. She still hasn't quite figured out what that means just yet.

"Well, guess I'd better be perfect, then." She hefts the grenade launcher in her lap, looking at it a little bemusedly. She's fired _guns_ before, not weapons on a scale like this.

Vaclav notices the front of the little boat start to drift and he realizes that's because Icarus has taken his hands off of it to drape over Malik and adjust her hold on the weapon, slide her right hand near the trigger, and brace it properly against her shoulder. Not that it had as much kick as some of his other weapons, but still. Vaclav watches in mild awe, that she's let someone so close, that the fearsome assassin who _growled and rumbled_ could be so gentle. If the night got any more bizarre, he'd assume he was dreaming.

She hums her thanks, tucks her leg over the lip of the boat to pull it close, and shoves it off, leaning backwards sharply to counterbalance. Vaclav lets it go at just the right moment to let the little craft go sailing off, and Malik watches it for a little.

When it's just starting to drift closer to the river's current, she aims high and squeezes the trigger. That recognizable _thonk_ sounded as the projectile soared from her hands. _If_ she did it right, the grenade would blow right over the boat and set it ablaze without breaking it apart. Half a second later, the night around them lit up as a relatively small explosion lit up the boat just underneath it, and the kerosene-soaked wood quickly caught alight.

Malik set the weapon aside, both her hands on the dock as she just watched the flames lick upward and consume the whole boat. Just like that, she'd lost a piece of herself. It had been gone in all senses of the word long before just now, but this was the final nail in the coffin that she drilled herself.

"She was a good leg," she starts, trying to sound somber, but the glint in her eyes probably gives her away, and both Adam and Vaclav make noises of amusements. "She took great care of me, despite all the abuse I put her through in college and in life. I'd say I'll miss her greatly, but I'm pretty sure my new one's gonna be way cooler, so." Vaclav laughs at that, and Malik smiles to herself. "Shit, I forgot my flask," she makes a show of digging around in her jacket, as if she'd ever had a flask of whiskey on her. "Who's going to pour one out for ol' leggy now?"

There's a cold metal object placed in her hand suddenly, and Malik looks down to it – an actual flask, and she looks up from her hand to the black alloy arm and up to Adam. Why is she surprised that _he_ of all people carried alcohol on him at all times? She snorts, pops the top and takes a swig – _strong_ scotch and she hadn't quite been ready, but she relishes the sudden warmth of fire down her throat. She pours the next sip onto the docks, and notices just the slightest furrowing of Adam's brows. The taste and that look both told her more than words could – that was some expensive whiskey.

"Mal, you shouldn't be drinking when you're on so many painkillers-" Vaclav protests, just a few moments too late. She shrugs helplessly, as if the decision had been out of her hands.

"Can't just let a friend go without drinking a toast," she replies teasingly, handing Adam back his flask. He immediately slides it into his coat, some dark pocket well-hidden, and she turns back to watching the flames. They're less intense than the first kerosene-filled moments, but still a pretty sight reflected on the dark waters, almost fitting into the reflected city skyline across the way.

A comfortable silence falls over them as they all watch the boat until the flames become embers, and there's a quiet crack as the boat breaks apart and is swept away. Malik watches a while longer, even when it's long gone. Something taken but not without a heavy price – they'd died for it and she would only come back stronger, more furious, with flames sharper and hotter than they had been before.

She shivers a little in the cold then, without something to fixate on, and almost doesn't notice it until Vaclav stands. "Well, guess we should get back home before it gets light." He bends down, offering her a hand up, and Icarus helps from the other side, the two of them lifting her and handing her crutches to put her weight back onto.

"Is this vampire-Vaclav? When did you switch out with normal Vaclav?" she prods, starting for the stairs, knowing they'd have more than enough time to catch up to her.

"That's my secret, Mal, I've always been a vampire." Just like those bad novels they read together, and Malik huffs at him.

"Right, sure. Whatever helps you sleep at noon."

Icarus says nothing, but he looks somewhat amused and not annoyed, so that was something.

Her leg aches a little less when she gets to bed that morning.


	10. System Upgrade

A week and a half later finds Malik lounging in the bay window, warmed by the afternoon sun and reading a paper book from Vaclav's shop. She's nearly dozed off, head leaning against the window, cushions propped under her leg to keep it comfortable and help her resist moving it. She's gotten better, and Vaclav had even supported her decision to decrease the painkillers. If she could handle the pain, better to take less before she made herself immune to them, and then needed to take something worse to deal with it. Adam still insisted on being in the same room with her, especially when she sat in the _window_ where any passerby (…passerboat) could see her, but he had at least relaxed a little and seemed to busy himself with other things. Polishing weapons, reading something on his HUD, or perhaps even dozing. It was an improvement.

Vaclav walks into this, his arms laden with a bundle in his arms, a big metal object. His best design yet, and Malik's new leg. It was almost that Caidin white, just a shade darker and so starkly different from Vaclav's silver and Icarus' carbon black. It was elegant and pristine, and the joins in it were seamless except for where they were wider cracks. What seemed to be a design flaw, except, when on and attached, glowed the same red as the phoenix on her coat. It looked like it held a phoenix's heart _inside_ of it, glowing radiant and beautiful. And it had all sorts of fun additions – a toned down dash, so she could spring off it into a run, a space to hide a gun _and_ a knife, heating that went searing (he remembers her boot on Otkar's throat) and room to add more whenever she wanted. He'd modeled it after her leg perfectly – no deviations like the gazelle and sprinter legs – to accommodate that she still had a flesh leg to use it with, and he made sure it articulated well enough to wear whatever shoes she wanted, be they heels or boots. He considered painting phoenix feathers on it, but decided he'd ask her if she wanted that or if that was perhaps too ostentatious. He hoped she'd like it.

"Mal?"

"Mmm, later," she mumbles, the book already closed in her lap with her finger holding the place she'd stopped, nearly dozing off. Icarus is the exact opposite, sitting up alert the moment he noticed what was in Vaclav's hands.

"Maal, you're really going to want to see this," he intones, that slight hint of whining at the edge of his voice. He'd worked on this so hard, so long, he couldn't wait for her to see it any longer. He had to know what she thought, _now_.

"What?" she rubs at her eyes as she wakes herself back up, yawning behind her hand as she turns to look-

She drops her book, the pages falling closed on the floor.

"Is that-?" A little breathless, leaning out over the floor instead of into the window, like she's moving to get up and come see for herself. Vaclav stops her from doing that by quickly walking over with it, bounding eagerly.

"Your new leg, yes. What do you think?" He's barely containing himself, but as Malik's hands reach for it reverently, hefting it into her lap, he thinks that he did good. That this was an aug deserving of the great Phoenix, of his best friend, of _Faridah Malik_.

"I love it," she can't even look up at him yet, still in awe. Her hands drifting over the contours of it, smooth and perfect. When she finally does lift her head, she's beaming bright, and it's like the last flame in her has sprung to the size of a bonfire. The glint in her eyes is one he hadn't seen in these last few weeks, and she doesn't even have it _on_ yet.

"Want me to put it on tomorrow?" He's grinning back at her, and if he had the wherewithal to spare a glance at Icarus, he'd see even the assassin smiling slightly. He doesn't, neither does Malik, both of them locked into their own moment, overjoyed and eager and in love with this piece of art.

" _Yes_."

"No food after nine, then," Vaclav wags a finger at her, and she snorts.

"You got it, _doctor_. We're sleeping here though."

Icarus huffs in the corner, catching both their gazes, and the faintest echo of that smile is still on his face.

"See, even the assassin likes a bed."

Malik drags herself up the next morning – she'd finally gotten better at using the crutches but she wouldn't _need_ to anymore after today, and she could not wait. Moving to make sure her plane was still in good condition, and Vaclav stops her, half asleep and yawning loud.

"We can do it here, Mal," he points out, moving with closed eyes into the kitchen and pawing around for the coffee machine.

"Am I hearing this right? The great Vaclav Koller, addicted to his dungeon and his ratty Chair, wanting to use another mechanic's workshop?" Malik asks, half certain she hadn't actually woken up yet and was just dreaming about her new leg.

Vaclav scratches at the back of his neck, a little sheepish. "What can I say? The mechanic who gave you this place kept a good shop. She- what did you say her name was?"

"Anya."

"Anya kept a clean shop. She has all the tools I did, but nicer. Wish I knew who she had as clients that she could afford all this."

"Ones who paid at all, maybe," Malik points out, leaning her crutches on the island in the kitchen and bracing her arms over the top, standing on her leg.

"Fair, fair point. Anyway, this should be fine. 'sides, I don't know what happened to my shop while I've been gone. Maybe someone took all my tools." He shrugs. He'd never really left the shop for that long before, and plenty of people knew it was his. It would be simple work to destroy it while he was gone, especially the bookshop itself which he couldn't upgrade with anywhere near as much security as it needed.

"I'm just glad you're not making me fly back after an operation. I'm still never sleeping in your bed again." The smell of coffee makes Malik jealous – she wants her own cup, her stomach growling loudly against the quartz countertop, but she just drops her face into her hands.

"We'll see about that," Vaclav teases, but inwardly he's also hoping that she's never in a state again where she has to crash on his bed. Somehow he thinks that's unlikely, but an aug can dream. "Let me finish my coffee and we'll get started."

The procedure goes about as well as it can. Icarus is watching him all the while he works, and while that kind of unrelenting gaze is unnerving and heavy, it helps steady his hands too. Vaclav asks for the assassin's help once he's ready to attach the new limb, shiny and new and fully tested.

"Hold her down for me," Vaclav says, focused enough that he doesn't even notice that it wasn't a question or request, but an order. Icarus complies though, his arms bracing heavy over her right shoulder and left hip, standing by her head to stay out of Vaclav's way as much as possible.

Vaclav swallows tight and attaches the leg, connects the PEDOT implants to their augmentation, and bites his lip as he activates the connection. The instant it happens is like a firework going off in his hands. Malik jerks hard, a noise half-caught between a groan and a shout, and Vaclav thinks for a second she's woken herself up from the sheer agony. Her new leg is trying to connect, to respond to the commands she's unconsciously sending it, to _act like a limb_. Which is good, it's all good, it means Vaclav did it _right_ , but it's certainly not the least painful process. Icarus' lips are a thin line, and they both understand, both know this.

Eventually she settles, still shaking barely under both their restraining arms, but the worst is past. Vaclav sighs, rubs an arm over his forehead and drops into a chair, reaching for his now-cold coffee. Better than nothing, and he chugs it straight down. Icarus is slower to move away, hovering near even after he's taken his arms off, and Vaclav contemplates that silently. Diligent and devoted to his work? Or something more? He was so inscrutable that Vaclav wasn't even sure he'd ever manage to guess right, at least not just yet. Maybe if he got to know the man behind the shades.

"She should be out for another half hour at least. Might as well let her rest." Vaclav turns to his tablets, checking readings and making sure the connection was as stable and solid as it appeared to be. Everything looked good on his end. He'd just have to see how she was doing when she woke up.

Malik wakes with a groan a short while later, slowly pulling herself to the minimum of consciousness. Vaclav and Icarus are there shortly, though with nowhere near the speed they had been when she'd been in Vaclav's Chair last.

"Hey Mal, how're you doin'?" Vaclav asks, gentle hands reaching to help her sit up. Icarus stays back, still not familiar enough with her despite all their time spent together to touch her so easily.

"Fine enough," she grumbles, that familiar weight and tire from being anesthetized an annoyance. She appreciates Vaclav's help, and shifts her legs-

Wait.

Her _legs_.

"-holy shit," she murmurs, eyes wide open and pupils wide as she stares down. The beautiful leg Vaclav had handed her just yesterday was a _part_ of her now, and the perfect seams between panels glowed red and _warm_. He hadn't shown her all of its upgrades, and she hadn't seen it on.

"Good holy shit or bad?" Vaclav asks, suddenly a little nervous. He thinks he knows Malik well enough to say that she loves it, but one could never be sure with something as critical as a large augmentation.

" _Very_ good," she answers immediately, gaze snapping up to his and beaming. Those might even be tears in the corners of her eyes, and she surges to hug him tight. He moves forward fast before she can fall off the chair, hugging her back, his shoulders slumping in relief.

"I promised, only the best for you," he murmurs into her shoulder.

" _Thank you_ ," is all she says in response. He gave her back her leg, worked tirelessly while she more or less just lounged around, and she'd put him under all this stress just because she'd been stupid and careless. And he didn't hold any of that against her, just dove right back in to help her when she needed it.

She couldn't ask for a better friend.

"What does it have?" she asks once he's pulled away, moving to dangle her legs over the chair and see if she can stand on it. No longer interested in any kind of patience – here was the light at the end, here was her ability to _be_ again.

"What _doesn't_ it have?" Vaclav responds, laughing and offering a hand to her. She ignores it for the moment, and he allows her that, the attempt at standing and moving without help for once in a long while. "I gave you a modified Icarus dash," saying the name makes him glance at the assassin, wondering if that's where he chose his moniker from, "you can't do a full dash, you'd need two leg augs for it, but you can boost off that one, to, perhaps, start running at speed, or, y'know, kick someone really hard." He's grinning. "I made spaces for you to put a gun and a knife, both of which should be undetectable by scanners," he didn't want her getting hurt like that again, and the foot's got a blade in the toe if you'd really like to punctuate things."

It's then that Malik realizes just how much she can do with a physical aug, with _more_ than just neural additions. How much more was possible. She'd save figuring out the knives until after she figured out _walking_ , though she supposed it might just be a simple neural cue.

"Anything else?" just how many augs could one fit into a single limb?

"It has the silencer, but that's kind of useless for anything but the noise it makes unless you want to hop around on one foot to be stealthy," he offers, laughing. "And a jump mod, so if you want to use that you're going to need to practice jumping off one leg." He shrugs, then. "I stopped there since I figured you wanted the leg sooner more than anything. There's still room in there if you decide you want anything else, just say the word and I'll make it happen."

"This is great, Vaclav. Thank you."

She bites her lip absentmindedly, focusing, and moves to stand. Her hands braced on the arm rest of the chair and the cushion, and her new leg responds well enough to what she wants it to do. It feels heavy, but she's not sure if that's from growing used to having _nothing_ there or because it really is heavier than her other leg. She wonders if Vaclav thought of that, too, and made it weigh precisely the right amount to not throw her off. She wouldn't put it past him.

The sensation of standing on two legs, of her stump pressing down on something, it's all new and-

Her aug leg buckles immediately.

Before Vaclav can even process the movement, the sudden bend in the knee of her augmentation, Icarus is there. His hands catching her lightly by the arms, helping stabilize her and get her weight on her other leg.

"You alright?" the assassin asks quietly, and Vaclav is suddenly reminded that if anyone understood getting used to leg augmentations suddenly, it would be him.

"It's not as easy as you make it look," she says accusingly at him, though there's that hint of amusement in her eyes.

He exhales a puff of breath, an eyebrow raised. "I've had my augs for years. I didn't walk on them the day I got them." Not exactly true, but she didn't need to know that.

"It moved so easily, I thought that's all there was to it." She glances at Vaclav, smiling despite leaning heavy on Icarus' support.

"I'm flattered Mal, but you _have_ to take it easy. It's gonna be a little before you really get used to having an aug limb."

"I could've guessed that much. Why can't I walk on it?" She tries to lean her weight on it again, this time with a little more success. Her leg bends at the knee but stays up.

"You probably sent it disagreeing signals. Your brain still thinks you're injured, but your leg is telling you it's all there. Put the two together and it's not quite sure what to do with itself. Like any good computer, it shuts down when it panics." He's almost smiling, but it seems more strained than anything else. Perhaps too much experience with that particular phenomenon.

"I'm sick of crutches," she grumbles, looking down at her leg accusingly, but taking them when Vaclav gets the hint and grabs them for her.

"You're almost there, Mal. Just a little longer."

"I wanna burn these when we're done too."

" _No_ ," Vaclav stops that idea before it can even begin. "I give these to clients – no burning."

" _Fine_ ," she laughs though, situating herself on the crutches. Icarus seems hesitant to let her go, his hands lifting off and hovering over her arms once she's stable.

"You got it?" the assassin asks, and Malik just nods, determined. She wants to be off those crutches by the end of the day. Especially if she wants to be attending the Gala in a few short weeks.

"Oh- Mal, you're going to have to…roughly double your nupoz dose, now." She'd been taking the minimum needed for neural additions, but now she'd have to take more to keep her body from rejecting the PEDOT implants in her leg too. "I'll get you an exact number in a bit."

Malik seems surprised by this – like she'd forgotten at all. She only took a dose once every few days as it was, but it made sense that she'd have to take more with a more extensive augmentation. "What's your dose like, super-assassin?" she asks lightheartedly, turning to Icarus.

"Don't need any," he answers shortly. Both Malik and Vaclav look at him, thinking that this might be…a joke? He looks perfectly serious, but that answer can't possibly be true.

"You don't…need neuropozyne?" Vaclav finally manages. He thinks he should've noticed maybe, when Icarus never asked for any nupoz vials after a visit. He'd just assumed the man was getting it from somewhere else.

"Nope."

Helpful and eloquent answers, as always.

"I guess that's lucky for you, then," Malik offers, a little uncertainly. It explained how he was able to have so many augs, at least – that many on someone who needed neuropozyne surely would've killed them from the drug alone.

"Something like that." He's looking at Malik now, or at least his shades are pointed at her. Watching her to see if she'd fall, or just in response to her statement, both were possible.

"Well, I'm going to go beat this leg into submission and make it work. Thank you Vaclav. Go get some sleep." He'd probably been awake for the last few days finishing up the aug, Malik knew.

"You got it, _mom_." Vaclav has been rubbing at his eyes since she woke up, and she thinks he's quite close to crashing, if she had to guess.

"You're grounded," she fires back, hobbling out of the room and towards the living room. She tries to put more weight on her aug with every swing of the crutches, hoping if she does it enough times it might finally stand on her request. It felt like her other leg did, she didn't need to consciously make it work, but It was fighting her now only because she'd already gotten halfway accustomed to not having a leg at all.

By the end of the day, Malik has slam dunked the crutches in the corner of the room, and is limping around carefully. She'll chalk that up to a win – no more under-shoulder aches, and Adam looks a little less like a coiled spring ready to leap and keep her from touching the ground.

Her leg still aches, and she imagines that pain won't go away anytime soon, but it's better than not walking at all. She feels a little more _herself_ , leaning against the counter in the kitchen and throwing together something to eat. She's starving, and has been looking forward to real food (not the ramen Vaclav offers, nor the cereal Adam turns to) since she'd been told to not eat anything.

She makes enough for the three of them, quick and dirty omelettes, and she catches Adam taking a large swig from his flask as she slides his plate toward him. "I know you only eat cereal and whiskey, but other things taste good too, you know."

"Hm. We'll have to see about that." His shoulders aren't so wound tight though, and he looks a little more relaxed.

"You'll find no better proof than my food." A pause. "Unless, that is, you've left all the ingredients to rot. Then I call sabotage." She dumps a second omelette in a plate for Vaclav, and sets to making one for herself.

He snorts, leaning against the island in the kitchen and not touching his food. Waiting for her, she supposes? Table manners are strangely unfamiliar, when she's gotten used to eating wherever she's sat and Vaclav has probably never sat at a table in his life, either. It's refreshing, and she smiles softly to herself at it.

She imagines she's watched Adam as closely as he's watched her these past few weeks, and likes to think she's gotten somewhat better at reading him. Small shifts in his body language that she had initially just assumed were closed-off actions but are entire reactions on their own. He kept his cards close to his chest, and she still hadn't actually seen his eyes – the one time she caught him with his shades off had been when he was taking a nap in the recliner by her bay window, but his eyes had been closed then. She _wanted to know_. What color were they?

She wonders why that's so important to her.

"Be right back." She leaves her omelette in the pan just slightly underdone and picks up Vaclav's plate to take to him – he's probably asleep, but if she leaves the plate by him the smell and warmth of it might wake him up enough to eat it and pass out again. She still has to hobble, but more of that is the ache of her raw leg. The aug itself responds beautifully, never stuttering and hardly making a sound. Vaclav hadn't been kidding about the silencers he'd installed.

Vaclav is, in fact, sleeping in a pile of parts, and she leaves the plate just above his hand, pulling the tablet from under his cheek and reaching for a blanket to toss over his shoulders. She couldn't force him in bed with a weak leg, and he'd wake up sooner if she did, anyway.

By the time she gets back to the kitchen, her meal is just ready, and she slides it into a plate and moves to sit next to Adam at the island. His omelette has cooled a fair bit by now, and she frowns – if she'd known he was going to wait she wouldn't have made his first.

"Cheers," she raises her glass of water to his flask – no alcohol while she was on painkillers, for now, at least – and his lips turn upward as he mirrors the action.

"Cheers," he says in response.

She grins and digs into her food, enjoying something _warm_ and _edible_ for the first time in too long.

"Whaddya think?" she says after a while and a gulp of water, a small pause before she finishes up the scraps.

"Passable," he answers, and she thinks the lilt in his voice is a _smug_ one.

"Sabotage. You waited too long to eat it," she points out, sounding annoyed as she waves her fork at him but grinning all the while.

"You can't prove anything," he fires back, and she laughs.

It startles her how _easy_ it's become to exist with him. Malik was used to being on the move always, to being close to very few people and only from afar, rarely spending too long with them for fear of putting them in danger. And yet, here she was, feeling comfortable and at ease next to this deadly assassin after just a few short weeks. He felt, well, almost like a _friend_. Which he'd probably take offense to, if she told him.

She waits until she's done eating, half-turning to look at him. He raises an eyebrow at her, taking another drink as he does.

"So, Adam, you ever been to a Gala?" there's a glint of mischief in her eyes, and even Vaclav might be worried if he saw that.

"The ridiculously extravagant parties the underground throws a few times a year?" he asks, and Malik would _swear_ that the arch of his eyebrow is getting even steeper. "Where everyone shows their faces?"

"Yeah, that one."

"Being elusive and mysterious are basically on my business card," he says by way of answer. She laughs, turning to face him better.

"I used to go at least once a year, and I think it might be the best place to remind everyone I'm still very much here."

"And you want me to come."

"If you'd like." She speaks less like a charge with a bodyguard, and more like a friend requesting a favor. Perhaps that's because she doesn't know when he'll want to quit, when he'll get tired of working for nearly free. "Should be fun. The Phoenix is alive _and_ she has Icarus?" The grin on her face is growing wider. "It'll be great."

He doesn't raise any complaints about the mention of belonging to her, and it hits her suddenly that _that_ is what she'd just said. That Icarus was hers. Was he? Even if he wasn't, it wouldn't be a bad image to give to the underground to chew on.

"Sure, why not?" he punctuates that with another drink, tilting his head back steeply to get the last of the whiskey.

"You're going to have to dress up, though. What did you call it, 'ridiculously extravagant'? Your trench coat won't cut it," she says, prodding a finger at the fabric of the coat.

He actually looks offended this time, rumbling, "This is a _custom_ piece."

"Still not fancy enough," she laughs. "Impress me."

"Is that a challenge, _Phoenix_?" He's looking at her sharply, she's sure of it.

"You bet your ass it is."


	11. The Gala

Malik has long made a habit of inviting Vaclav along to her gala shopping, whether it was in person or just via call, specifically to make fun of all the ridiculous fashion she found. She usually attended those events in a suit, sleek and tailored for her, the picture of grace and power. But this time, she thought something that showed off her new leg might be more fitting.

Besides, she had an _escort_ this time. And wouldn't it be nice to wipe that smug look off the assassin's face?

She hasn't realized she's vocalized that thought until Vaclav laughs, steering her away from the suitjackets and toward the dresses on a moment's notice.

"Well, he let you walk into a public store without him, so that's something," the mechanic says, starting to pull at the fabric of dresses as they pass. Even he usually wouldn't want to come, preferring to laugh from afar, but they've all been cooped up for a while and Icarus wouldn't leave Malik _alone_ , so of course Vaclav had to offer to go. What was the point of 'wiping that smug look off his face' if it happened in the store and not outside the event itself?

It's still a week to the event itself, and Malik is walking on her leg like she's had it for years, not days. She was a quick study in all things that let her do things _faster_ , and this was no exception. Fluid and agile, the picture of ease. She was going to turn heads and knock them all dead, more so than usual.

It's as Vaclav is thinking this that Malik stops in the middle of the aisle. Her face breaks into a grin and she drags Vaclav towards a red dress with a slit in the side, and she's immediately going to try it on. Her only complaint with it in the end is that it doesn't show off her leg _enough_ , and could they please tailor it with a higher cut. The woman running the store, an aug herself, only nods appreciatively at Malik's leg and says she'll have it done within the next two days. Vaclav thinks the dress is perhaps a little simple, the shoulders bare and with little flair to it, but the way Malik is eyeing that piece of clothing, he has a feeling there's more to it that even he doesn't know of.

She picks up the dress a few days later, and Vaclav has never known her to be so excited over something that wasn't adrenaline-involved. Or maybe it is – he's only been to one gala and it was the most terrifying experience in his life (aside from Otar's gun being held to his head). Perhaps she's already thinking ahead to the event itself.

She had been doing exactly that. There was one piece of clothing she'd been holding onto for months, stowed secretly in her plane, and while she'd had no idea what to do with it before except that she needed it, the pieces all fell together perfectly for it now.

Malik had dropped Vaclav back off at his shop, making sure all was as it should be, before taking off toward Paris for the night's event. Adam was still in his trenchcoat, which Malik frowned disapprovingly at, but he said nothing in response. To be fair, though, she was wearing her flightsuit – never knew when something would go wrong mid-trip, and while she _could_ fly in heels, it would ruin the surprise, now wouldn't it?

"I'm sure you know all the big names, but now you'll get to see their breathing faces put to names. There's always something exciting happening at a gala, especially the winter one. That's when all the good deals get struck, and when all the bloodshed happens."

"Bloodshed?" Adam asks, sounding curious.

"Sure. They can't ban weapons, since augs essentially _are_ weapons, and that 'wouldn't be fair to naturals', so fights tend to escalate. It's always fun to watch the hierarchies shift over one drink."

"Wouldn't have taken you for the political intrigue type," he mentions, leaning against the wall behind her chair.

"Me either," she laughs, shrugging. "It's almost as fun as skydiving, especially when you're not involved. I can't really afford to ignore it though, not with my whole supply network relying on existing at the fringes of all of the other scuffles."

He makes a thoughtful noise, and she just starts seeing the skyline of Paris in the distance. She knew exactly where to go – while they hadn't used this exact place before, all the high-class but not necessarily lawful venues were in a relatively small area. She notes the one marked on her invitation, and finds a nearby dark roof to land on, already populated with a few personal vehicles. Most of the higher ups flew to these things, while others had drivers and took the streets.

Malik touches down, and Adam is already moving to scan their surroundings, double-checking that all the parked planes were in fact devoid of any activity. While he does that, she shuts down her plane, and stands, reaching for the bag with her clothes in it. She certainly wasn't going to fly in them, and she didn't want them wrinkled.

"I'll be out in a sec," she calls, shutting the bay door and unzipping her flightsuit. She changes quick, glancing down and smiling wide as the white of her leg stands out starkly against her red dress, and the glow in her aug complements it. She had a pair of gold earrings and gold heels – with the added benefit of them sparking when dragged against the floor – and one might think those were to match with Adam's gold and black augs. Except she had one more thing to put on. The one she'd been holding close to her chest. She pulls out a gorgeous capelet, made of a fine gold mesh and inlaid with golden _feathers_. Pulling it over her head, and it settles over her shoulders like it was _made_ for her.

Malik steps out of the VTOL, the movement catching Adam's eye, and he's already turning towards her when he freezes. Shoulders rigid, and she thinks something's wrong for a moment, before she realizes that she's had the _exact_ reaction out of him she wants. She makes sure to record the moment for posterity. Icarus, the great assassin, struck speechless not out of will but by reaction.

She grins, wide and sharp. "I told you it was fancy, didn't I?"

That seems to snap him out of it, and he straightens up without saying anything. In retaliation – that's what it is, it _has_ to be – he pulls off his trench coat. Where he usually wore an armored chestplate, he was now wearing a sharp vest, a crisp shirt underneath with the arms rolled up to the elbows, showing off the sleek curves of his augs. Slacks and those are _dress shoes_ , and it's Malik's turn to be speechless.

"Is this _impressive_ enough for your standards, Phoenix?" he asks, and she laughs sudden, amused and warm.

"It'll do." She reaches to take his coat and put it in the plane, and although he seems unhappy to give it up, he makes no complaints. She locks up her VTOL and gestures at the small walkway between this building and the one of the event. "Shall we?"

"After you."

Malik manages to suppress the wild grin on her face by the time they get to the floor they are headed for. The elevator doors open into an extravagant hall, with lights strung up and standing tables scattered throughout. The decorations are sparse, but where they can be seen are winter berries and dark, elegant garlands. The room is crowded, Malik had made sure they would arrive just slightly late, and this being the winter Gala and the most extravagant of all, a young man by the elevator announces their entrance. A young kid trying to work his way up the ranks of an organization, perhaps.

"The Phoenix, accompanied by Icarus," the kid says, his voice carrying over the speakers.

The room falls instantly silent.

Heads whirl to confirm that this youngblood had gotten that _right_ , because everything that had been known before this was that the Phoenix was dead and Icarus would drop dead before ever coming to an event like this.

Malik struggles again to keep herself from grinning sharp and wide and triumphant. Let them all revel in the fact that their information sources were _wrong_ , and that she had foiled the attempts of all who tried to kill her. Let them see that she was unkillable, and that she would return _better_ , brighter, as that new leg attested.

The music has slowed to a stop at the silence, and there's a tension in the room strung tight enough to slice through a man's throat.

"Miss me?" she asks, and she sees a few faces look _relieved_ – her contacts across Europe, to be sure – at the knowledge that they hadn't been left high and dry, to fend for themselves and make new contracts.

One such contact of hers had been talking to another man as they'd walked in, and he now looks angry at the man who he'd been speaking to. She recognizes the contact, the angry one, as her inlet to the Parisian slums in the catacombs. "You told me she was _dead_ ," he growls, just loud enough for her to hear.

Adam stiffens just behind her, she can feel him tensing just over her shoulder, and she wonders what he's seen that she hasn't picked up on yet.

" _You-_ " the man who was speaking to her contact whirls to face her fully now. "You're _supposed_ to be dead!" he punctuates this with a sudden movement, whipping out a gun and pointing it at her.

Time seems to slow – thank you, neural augs – and she wonders why she doesn't feel concerned. Perhaps a small pistol couldn't scare her any longer after she'd survived a shotgun at point-blank range.

As the man is reaching to pull the trigger, Icarus' arm snaps up, and with his sleeves rolled up she can see in perfect detail as his arm opens up. She's so fixated on that, curious, that she almost misses the nanoblade that launches out of it and straight into the man's throat, pinning him against a pillar behind him. His gun goes off into the floor as he's staggered, choking blood and dying in short order.

Malik doesn't realize that she hasn't taken a breath until her lungs ache, and she does her best to remain composed, half-turning her head to look at him. _Impressed_. His reaction was lightning-fast, bullseye-accurate, and unbelievable. There's a strange twist in her chest in the aftermath, and she'll just have to think about that later.

It was time to capitalize on this _now_. "I guess that guy didn't miss me," she shrugs, winking at her Parisian contact who, thankfully, looks pleased at the turn of events. "It'll take a lot more than some roughshod second-rate thugs to kill me." She strides in, the gold feathers on her capelet trailing after her, almost floating behind her, and Adam follows close behind, his arm closed up and whole again.

She can't tell if the awed reactions are in response to her return or Icarus' presence and seeming alliance with her, but she'll take either at the moment. Both are very, very good and quite useful.

She opens a call with Adam and subvocalizes, the smallest hint of a smile on the corners of her lips as they walk into the crowd. "I'll give it to you, that was _good_ ," she glances at him as she says so, and she sees his eyebrows peek over his shades in surprise. Perhaps he wasn't expecting the praise or wasn't used to it. "I have to go have a word with all of my contacts and make sure they haven't all defected on me like Paris was about to," she explains. "You're free to wander, if you like. This is a pretty one-of-a-kind event, and I'm sure they all want to talk to you."

Adam's disapproving rumble is almost loud enough for Malik to hear it outside of their channel, and he seems to step even closer to her back after the words. "That would make coming as your bodyguard useless," he argues.

She shrugs. "I refuse to accept any blame if you get bored to death."

Malik's first stop is with her Parisian contact, Alexandre. He's the closest to the entrance of those she knows, and perhaps he knows who it was that tried to shoot her. She glides to him, unaffected by the bloodshed, casting only a passing glance to the body slumped against the wall, the nanoblade sticking perfectly out of the center of his throat.

"Alexandre," she greets him with a genuine smile, reaching a hand forward.

He takes it, shaking it once firmly and smiling wide. "Madame Phoenix," he answers. "How glad I am to see that what I was told is _not_ true." His French accent is thick on his tongue, and she only speaks in English with him because he told her he wouldn't associate with her if she spoke to him in her struggling French. She'd been getting better, but she'll spring it on him at a later date.

"You can't kill a phoenix," she just answers, her arm clasped in his a moment longer.

"So they say." He glances down at her leg as he lets go of her hand, nodding appreciatively. "I do not recognize that- what is it?"

"Custom, of course," she replies.

"Of course."

Adam is standing close over her shoulder, alert and watching everyone around so that she didn't have to. This is the longest he's been in such proximity to her, but if it means she doesn't have to pay so much attention to a knife coming for her back, then she'll take it.

"How is everything? I hope no one's in real trouble without any deliveries recently," she starts.

"No, no, we Parisians are not _stupid_ , Madame, I always instruct the recipients to keep some kind of stock just in case something were to happen. Who knows when the next augmentation shortage will occur?" He is quick to reassure her, to keep up his competent image even if perhaps what he says is not entirely true.

"Thank goodness. I'll get you a shipment as soon as I can. How is your wife?" A waiter passes by with a tray of champagne flutes, and Malik gracefully takes one as he passes, smoothly enough that he doesn't even have to pause on his route.

"She is doing well, thank you. She has finally taken to the new arm, and is learning how to not break _all_ of our butter holders."

Malik laughs, warm. "Tell her I can now appreciate that feeling, and I hope she can get back to her embroidery soon."

"I will, Madame Phoenix. Welcome back." He lets her go, wandering off as another of her contacts walks up to her, to see her in the flesh.

The rest of the evening passes in much the same way. Alexandre hadn't been able to identify the man who'd tried to kill her – he'd only just started talking to him, and the body didn't have any identifying markers. Frustrating, but unsurprising.

Adam remains close to her the whole time, standing just behind her. Each time she is approached, he moves closer pre-emptively, as if he will need to shield her from a new threat. She doesn't worry about any of her existing contacts – though most of them express surprise and perhaps a little bit of apprehension at Icarus' presence –but there's a few new faces she hasn't talked to before. She instinctively tenses when they walk up, used to attending these alone and needing to be prepared to hold her ground, but each time she does, Adam is there. Close. Over her shoulder and she feels…at ease? Safe?

She must be losing her mind if she feels _safe_ at a gala.

That or she really should've gotten a bodyguard long ago.

It's a productive event. Beyond intimidating the ones who meant her harm _and_ making a statement on her allies, she's able to make a list of all the cities that need her most, and then the ones to tend to after. She'd have to pull off a few large heists to make up for the time she was gone, would have to use up a few more warehouses whose employees were her plants.

She's perched at one of the standing tables, forcing others to come to _her_ if they want to speak with her, befitting of an organization leader – roughshod though her organization might be – and she's thoughtfully staring at the bottom of her champagne flute, almost empty. Planning routes and best calculating how to get the most augs to the crews that needed her the most desperately.

Malik doesn't even notice she's been approached – so lost in thought, and already acclimating to Adam's alert guard –until Adam's arm is carefully moving to the small of her back. That light touch jerks her from her thought, and she notices the large Scandanavian man smiling shark-toothed and wide at her.

"Phoenix," he greets her, and she responds with a welcoming but bemused smile.

"I don't believe we've had the pleasure." She answers, offering her hand.

"I generally try to keep it that way. But word that Icarus was here? I had to see for myself. I'm Anders, the king of Northern Europe." He does a half-bow, and though he seems all smiles there's a danger hidden in his eyes, in the way he carries himself so arrogantly.

"You already know who I am," she says, a counterpoint. The Phoenix needs no introduction, and those esteemed enough to get an invitation to this event would recognize her on sight, despite her work to hide who she really was to anyone outside this circle. It worked well this way, sowed some confusion.

Until it cost her her leg, anyway.

"I do." A pause as he straightens up, and he's no longer looking at her, his gaze fixed on Adam instead. "How much does she pay you? I'll triple it."

Ah. Malik is surprised at how suddenly she is furious, and is proud of herself for hiding any evidence of that reaction. Best to let Adam answer this himself, lest anyone think they could get behind her and to him another way. She half-turns to look at him, never letting Anders out of her sight but curious to see his reaction.

"I don't accept jobs while working others." His answer is firm, gruff, and wholly uninterested. Partially because she's paying him a pittance, probably, and 'triple' that still wouldn't reach what he normally charged his clients.

"Not even for more?" Anders looks something between impressed and furious beyond measure. He was clearly accustomed to getting whatever he asked for – whether he built the network he relied on or it was handed to him was a question that needed its own answer.

"No. Find me like my other clients do if you'd like me to hear your request." It's an obvious dismissal, and Malik is awed yet again at the total ambivalence he displays to the rank and hierarchy of these mob bosses. She supposes she might feel that way too if she could kill these men in her sleep. Rank meant nothing if you couldn't be protected from those who wanted you dead, and if the best in the business didn't want to protect someone, they would very likely be dead by the end of the month – since usually, that person had been hired to take a hit on said client.

Adam was different from all the other hitmen, bodyguards, mercenaries she knew of. He wouldn't betray for a larger paycheck – or perhaps he would, but he hadn't done so to her yet – he would remain hyperfocused for hours, and he accepted far less than his time was worth. How had she gotten so lucky?

"Fine. You'll regret this." He walks off, straight to the bar, and Malik raises an eyebrow after him.

"Doubt it," is all Malik hears over their channel, and she suppresses a snort as he says so.

He'd stood close to her throughout that entire exchange, a hand on her back and coiled to spring just in case Anders would take out his anger against her.

He wasn't the last to request Adam's services that night, though the following individuals managed somehow to be polite and humble while asking.

Icarus refused them all – except for one girl. She was small, blonde and dainty, and when she asked him for his help, he shook his head but slipped her a business card. Malik saw the exchange, and glanced quickly towards the ceiling to avoid drawing any attention to the movement. She wonders what was different about this girl that made Adam reconsider his earlier policy.

She wants to know more about him, how he decides these things and what drives him.

She'll find out if it kills her.

The event starts to turn from business to party as more and more of the deal-makers get drunk. The music turns upbeat and melodies take the forefront instead of simply being something in the background to provide noise.

Malik has spoken to everyone that she needed to, and it's usually at this point that she leaves these events – never _quite_ trusting a party full of drunk men – but this time she almost wants to see it through. She's far less worried with Adam at her side, and she's barely had anything to drink. Adam, on the other hand, hasn't had _anything_ , as far as she's seen anyway. Maybe he'd snuck a drink from his flask while she'd been talking to someone earlier. She almost wants to ask but doesn't want to offend him if that's a standard of his.

"They're probably gonna start dancing soon," she says to him, glancing at the middle of the room as the small groups of people chatting start to disperse.

"What?" He heard her, but even that seems too much for the criminal infrastructure that existed in Europe. American organized crime, perhaps, but not European.

"They're starting to hit the point where they've drunk too much to make any more deals, so might as well party." She shrugs. "I usually leave around now, but I want to see these losers dance." Malik stops leaning against the high table and moves toward the bar.

Adam says nothing, quirking an eyebrow at her, and she waves it off. She can see the looks on some of those with lesser poker faces, awed at how easily she's interacting with Icarus. Some of them are reevaluating how much an alliance with her might be worth, if she could afford to hire him as a bodyguard. Little do they know he's doing this for free, and she watched the feared assassin pour whiskey in his cereal instead of milk one morning, too asleep to notice.

"First drink's on me," she offers as they reach the bar, which is carved out of a dark oak and polished to a shine under the hanging lights above. The portion she rests her arms on is still warm from the last person to order a drink, and her finger idly traces a knot in the wood.

"No thanks," he answers, glancing around the two of them like he has been doing once or twice a minute the whole night.

"I trust you to be able to handle yourself after just _one_ drink," she says, turning away from the barman to look at him. "Or are you telling me you're a lightweight?" a teasing smirk on the corner of her lips.

"Drink and work don't mix," he answers, and she'd swear he was looking at her _sternly_.

"Work's mostly done. Don't make me have to drink yours for you." She orders something strong for herself, and a good whiskey for him. Did he like any other drinks? She'd have to ask.

The barman slides her a glass as one of her Norwegian contacts approaches her, looking nervous. He's glancing over his shoulder, and she tries to find who he's looking for casually, without catching his attention. He's so preoccupied, that shouldn't be too difficult.

"Petr," she greets him with a smile, raising her glass to him.

She brings the glass to her lips, about to take a sip. Adam's hand is suddenly at her waist, a light, tense squeeze like he's trying to get her attention. She pauses, and in the moment's hesitation he fluidly takes the glass from her. He holds it up to the light, almost as if he's going to propose a toast.

And crushes it.

The movement is effortless, and the crack of the glass is much quieter than the shower of shards onto the floor.

Malik has half a mind to be offended, but she catches the direction Adam is staring in and sees Anders. Who had called himself the king of northern Europe. Her gaze snaps to Petr, eyes narrowed and still holding herself with poise, as if her bodyguard didn't have an arm covered in glass and alcohol. The pieces come together much faster than they would have on her own – Adam had seen something in her drink that wasn't just alcohol, and had spared her from finding out just what.

"Tell me you were put up to this, and I might go easy." She sounds at ease, and she's anything but. The hand that she'd had on the bar moves slowly, imperceptibly, towards her leg.

"Mal, I swear- he has my family" he looks earnest enough in his desperation.

It's not good enough.

Malik moves lightning-quick, reactions honed from years of reckless piloting, whipping out her knife from its place in her aug and slamming it down onto Petr's hand, through it and into the bar.

He yelps, his other hand shooting to it as if it could do anything. She's still holding onto the handle of the knife, and as she leans forward he leans back, not even challenging her. Her attack had been precise – it hurt like a bitch but he'd be fine.

Her voice is a low murmur, inaudible to any but the two of them and Adam.

"So instead of coming to me and asking for help, you fell into his demands and betrayed me?" She had no idea what Adam had seen in her drink, but that didn't matter.

"Y-yes-" he knows better than to not answer her after she's asked him a direct question.

"Mm. Well, I wish you the best and hope your family gets out of this safe, considering you failed whatever it was you were supposed to do to me." She pulls the knife out quickly, and he sags against the bar, sliding toward the ground and cradling his hand close to his chest. "You made me get my knife bloody," she complains, reaching over the bar and pulling the first drink rag she feels, wiping her weapon off and sliding it back into her leg. She should kill the barman, honestly – they were supposed to make sure no one got poisoned at these events, or else people would stop coming.

Adam glances at her, and she thinks he looks…impressed? It's enough to distract her from her plans of killing the barman.

"Anders left as soon as you pulled a weapon," he says to her.

She could tell him to chase after the man, but there's no point. "Let him run with his tail between his legs. Maybe I'll expand North next."

Adam's shoulders twitch, and she thinks he's suppressing a laugh. Of course – couldn't have regular criminals seeing that he had a sense of _humor_.

The assassin reaches for her wrist, and she thinks for a moment that there's more trouble. That his presence has made her an assassination attempt magnet – it very well may have; if someone can kill Icarus' charge, then he wasn't infallible – or that maybe she's royally pissed off someone she shouldn't have. He shakes his head as soon as he sees her tense, and there's the smallest _smile_ at the corner of his lips.

"Icarus?" she asks, confused.

"You said there would be dancing." He's starting to look _smug_ , and Malik wants to punch that look off his face.

"Yes, and?"

"You wanted to send a message. This should do it." He's pulling her to the center of the floor, and she wonders who's really in charge here. Wasn't it supposed to be her?

The hand he'd been pulling her by the wrist with shifts to hold her hand, and he pulls her other hand to his shoulder. They're at the center of the opening in the floor, and she's never _danced_ at one of these, let alone stayed long enough to see anyone do so. The attempt to poison her had thrown her off, and this had caught her off guard so badly that she wasn't able to do anything but follow him.

The music shifts, less upbeat and more for dancing to, a wintery jazzy thing. Malik is still in shock that this is _happening,_ that stoic, unflinching _Adam Jensen_ is pulling her to a dance.

It's too late for her to refuse – they've already garnered the attention of half the event.

"Are you fucking with me?" subvocal, and she's looking at him in disbelief even as he takes a step and she follows.

"Mostly with everyone else here, but I can add your name to the list." There's an actual smirk on his face, self-satisfied and smug, and Malik is almost slack-jawed in awe.

"Who are you and what have you done with my bodyguard," she says, following his lead easily, unable to look anywhere but at him.

"Nothing," he says, and his shades flick off.

Everything stops.

Dimly, Malik is aware she's still following his lead, and that the smirk on his lips has grown _wider_ , but she's too preoccupied with the fact that she's seeing his _eyes_. They glint golden in the light, lenses shifting as he pulls her across the floor, and they're beautiful augments too.

Subconsciously, she finds herself adding 'eyes' to her list of parts to look for.

"You _are_ fucking with me," she finally manages, her throat dry as they dance, and even though there are others dancing near them, all eyes are on her and the assassin.

"You said you wanted them all to know Icarus was yours," he says, and _oh_. This is revenge for _that_.

She's not sure how to feel about this. All she knows is that she has to make it through this dance, and then they can leave, and she can think about it _later_. For now, her image matters most.

The song crescendos towards its end, and for a moment she thinks he's going to dip her. She cuts that off at the pass, curling her augmented leg around his thigh as the song ends, and she's unable to look away from him, grinning sharp right back at him. He almost seems startled at the movement, but doesn't let it show for longer than an instant. They're bound like this, and she wonders if this is still that cat-and-mouse fucking with each other or…something else.

The thought hits her hard and she drops her leg, pulling away from him and casually adjusting her dress back.

"Shall we?" it's quiet, and the next song is beginning and she doesn't even hear it. "I still need my drink."

"After you, _Phoenix_." The shades snap back over his eyes, and she'd almost think she imagined the golden augs if it hadn't jarred her so.

She definitely needed that drink.

The flight home was silent, companionable – she refuses to accept it being anything else. Nope. The event was a success and nothing short of it. A resounding success, actually. She had made it clear that she could not be so easily killed, that she had powerful allies, and that those allies were willing to fight for her.

She thinks again to the man with the gun, his body pinned to a pillar for the rest of the evening.

Adam was just doing his job. She hadn't seen him at work before – he probably treated every target and enemy as brutally and efficiently.

"Where are we stopping tonight?" he asks her, interrupting her quiet pondering as she flies out of the city of Paris.

"Safehouse just outside city limits," she answers, still in her gala clothes. She hadn't bothered changing out for such a short flight.

"I got a request I need to take care of, but I'll be back quickly," he tells her, coming to the cockpit and she notices he already has his trenchcoat back on when she glances over her shoulder.

"The blonde girl at the gala?" she asks, curious.

"Yes. Her…escort sent her over to test the waters for him, but she requested I instead take him out." He's staring out the window, and his shades are down anyway, so Malik can't quite get a read on what he's thinking.

"You want me to drop you off anywhere specific?" she asks, offering her help. She could get herself home and survive a night in one piece, and he was still an assassin. Couldn't let the underground think he'd gone soft now that he was guarding, and grow complacent in the thought that they were safe from him. It was, perhaps, the best time for him to strike.

"No. Better you're not seen too close." He moves back to the back of the plane, and she's surprised. He's still putting her safety first, even if it makes his job harder. Should she really be so surprised? Maybe he was just always so thorough, so careful about keeping his allies hidden and protected.

"I'll leave a drink out for you," she says as she lands in a copse of trees near a small isolated house, just outside the city. It sat upon a hill just high enough that she could see the Eiffel Tower with its white coil curling up and supporting it from her front yard.

"Don't wait up," he says, hopping out of the back door and cloaking.

"Only if you promise to lock the door behind you when you come home." She's grabbing her flightsuit, folding it over her arm, and she hasn't even noticed that he paused as she said that.

"Tell me you're not leaving your doors unlocked when someone isn't home."

She laughs, and the dance –and all its repercussions - feels far away already. "Guess you'll have to find out, won't you?"


	12. Wax Wings

The attempts on Malik's life grow in number after the gala. Some of them are from assassins just trying to make a name for themselves in the same way Adam did, but instead of killing other assassins, they go after her. A cheap cop-out, though it never works for them. Some are after her, and she gathers that she pissed _someone_ off at the gala, but can't pin down exactly who. Others are trying to get to Adam through her, trying to piss off Icarus for refusing their job demands. She thinks she should be most offended about those. They're not even _after_ her.

Today's flavor is of the latter.

Malik is yawning, standing at the bar of a coffee shop near one of her safehouses. She'd flown all night, still trying to catch up from the months where she hadn't made any raids or deliveries. The backlog would take her ages to get through if she didn't work double-time – she usually timed everything perfectly, and people needed augments _now_. So she'd coordinate raids in the day and then run them that night for a few weeks. No big deal.

She is _exhausted_.

It's a good thing she has Adam watching her back, because she might've walked into traffic by now on her own as it was. Coffee was about the only thing keeping her going – though she always woke right up when she got in her plane, assisted along the way with a few dives 'just for fun'.

He tenses behind her the moment she steps to the front of the line, and she doesn't even pay the reaction any mind. Until the cashier leans forward sharply at her, his augmented hand bending at a ninety-degree angle and showing a dark barrel underneath.

She's not impressed.

"Can this wait until after I have my coffee?" Maybe she's getting complacent with Icarus at her side, but she wouldn't be so careless without him around either.

"You- _what-_ " He's actually surprised that she's so flippant at his threat. Maybe he thought himself better than all those who had tried previously. Maybe he just plain didn't know how often she had to deal with shit like this now.

She throws her hands in the air and turns to walk away. "Fine, fuck it. I'll go next door." Another café, just across the street, and her second favorite when the lines were long at this one.

The cashier sputters something again, and then immediately his knees buckle and he falls onto the countertop with a thud. Silently. Either Adam poisoned or tranquilized him. She doesn't much care.

"Miss," a trembling barista catches her attention.

If he's about to make her stay and talk to the police, she'll shoot herself and then him. "What."

"Large latte for you- just how you like it." He's holding it out more like it's a live grenade than a cup of coffee.

Her shoulders slump immediately as she takes it from him and inhales. Yes, it _is_ just how she likes it. She takes a long drink. "Thanks." She tosses him a credit chip in gratitude – one of the few small ones she'd looted off an assassin or two in the last month or so. "Did you want something?" she asks Adam, turning to look at him with an eyebrow quirked.

He returns the expression, which would have been hilarious if she was a coffee and a half in.

"Cool. Back to work then."

"I never went on break." He points out, following her out of the store.

"Sucks."

Malik eventually catches up on her backlog. Mostly. At a slightly slower pace when she almost walked in through the front door of a Caidin plant in the middle of the day instead of waiting for the _actual raid_.

She grumbles about how she's fine, they're almost done anyway, but it's one against three when Pritchard decides to chime in too.

So she promises the rest of her people she'll have their stocks back to normal by the end of the year, but until then to send her itemized part lists of whatever they needed urgently and she'd do her best.

It also has the unfortunate side effect of bringing her that much closer to any tragedies the world over. It was one thing to know that a city like Prague was descending into a living hell. It was another to receive a parts list that went 'desperately need: 6 legs (pairs), 4 left arms, 3 right arms, 2 ribcages' and think, _shit, there must have been another bombing._

That wears on her too.

It's late fall, and the whistling of the wind on the rooftop distracts her as she pries open a box of augs to double-check its contents. Adam is standing a few feet away, watching outward while she leans into the crate and moves metal aside, the clanking of alloy as she did a mental inventory.

There's another rustle Malik doesn't hear, and she sees at the bottom of the box, the children's size augs she'd been searching for. Satisfied, she straightens up-

" _Faridah_!" it's a silent warning on their channel, and before she can register why, or even _where_ Adam is, he's shoving her all the way into the plane, jabbing the close-door button on the bay.

The rustle-

It hadn't been the wind.

It had been the disengaging of glass cloaks.

The fight is loud, gunshots ringing out just outside her plane as she stumbles toward the cockpit to light up the engines. She could pop the side door for just a second to let him in and they'd be away.

Now that they'd uncloaked, her radar was alight and she sees a _plane_ in the distance, aiming straight for her.

"We've got more company incoming," she warns, strapping herself down and blasting the engines faster than they should be turned on. She could repair any damage later. "You ready? Popping the door in three-"

She hears the acknowledgement from him, hears the distinct sound of a nanoblade slicing through flesh, another gunshot, and then a dash. He's in the door the moment it's opened, and as soon as she registers his presence she guns hard for the sky.

This is the most coordinated attack on her yet, at least since she'd picked up Adam. Whoever was behind this really wanted her dead, and had a lot of money to spare on that effort.

She's lifting off the roof at a forward glide instead of directly up, hoping to get away from jumping distance as fast as possible. Not fast enough though, as one of the assassins – with two sprinter augs, she notes – winds up a sparking charge.

"Adam-!"

"I see it."

He doesn't do anything, though. Not yet. Pulling back as though he hasn't noticed the wind up, the noisy sparking augs.

When the runner leaps, he aims perfectly for the gap, the barely-open door of her plane.

Icarus is ready for him. He catches the jumper by the throat, pulls him in and slams him hard against the wall. Malik shuts the door, the screaming of the wind as they pick up speed dying down to an outside muffle.

Perhaps not the best hostage target – if he'd been intending to jump into their plane, he likely had already ditched any signs pointing to his employer. An unsuspecting assailant would have been better. Icarus was… _persuasive_ , though.

Malik can't think anymore on that as bullets shred along the side of her wing, no doubt ruining the paint job. She spirals away, hears a thud of something crashing into a wall in the back. Hopefully an assassin. Hopefully not _her_ assassin. The attacker evidently is expecting her to start running, pivoting sharply to chase her. She foils all expectations of that, pulling the stick back hard and soaring upwards, killing the engines to flip back over, and screaming down at the unlucky bastard, her own guns lighting up. This Phoenix had talons, and she'd vowed to never be caught unarmed again – that included when she was in the skies.

There's a satisfying bout of flame as she rips off the other plane's left wing, far more successful in her maneuver than it had been against her, and only when she's certain she sees it careening towards the rooftop does she start pulling away.

No point in overstaying their welcome and letting someone pull out a sniper rifle while she was busy having fun.

She bottoms out of her dive before they get in shooting range of the roof, veering hard and peeling away in the opposite direction of all her nearest safehouses. Best to let them think she was going somewhere different, some dead end they might try to chase her down.

"You alright back there? I didn't pack any sick bags." She's talking to Adam more than anything else, but the would-be assassin groans first. It sounded like he'd hit his head a few times in that quick fight.

"Fine," Icarus answers her shortly. That was good enough for her. She'd let him deal with their guest while she took an extra careful route home.

She calls Pritchard, relieved that he picks up instantly despite it being 5AM in the states.

"Phoenix," he greets, half a grumble and- maybe he hadn't been quite so awake.

"Caught another one for you. Think you can find anything?" The last few assassin's they'd caught had been unhelpful, providing no information before Icarus killed them. Malik hoped that Pritchard might be able to get something out of their infolinks, perhaps not a name, but even a _location_ of who was sending them information, targets.

There's a scramble on his end of the line, and she thinks perhaps that was enough to get him to wake up. Maybe he'd get lucky this time.

By the time she gets them home, the assassin is very unconscious, Adam is hovering over her shoulder, and Pritchard has. Finally found something, judging by the loud thunk of something being knocked over.

"Fuck. _Finally_! Got 'em," he tells her, sending her a pair of coordinates. "You know how many reroutes these assholes use? They had three separate VPNs bouncing them in and out of Australia, for fuck's sake."

Malik snorts. "Thanks, Pritch. Go get some sleep."

"Yeah, no thanks to you." It's a grumble, but a good-natured one. He hangs up, and she glances up and behind her.

Adam looks back, meets her gaze – she knows this, even with the shades – and quirks an eyebrow.

"You ready to go hunting?" she asks, a small smirk playing at the edge of her lips.

"Depends on how much whiskey you've got in this plane." He answers, leaving her side to go and deal with the attacker. Perhaps by throwing him out the cargo door before they get close to home.

She laughs to herself, angling down for her safehouse. "You can stop in before you head out."

"It's only fair." He answers, from the back. He maybe says something else, but she doesn't hear it over the sudden roar of the wind.

Malik was just taking off from a shipment dropoff – a box of Caidin parts for a mechanic she sponsored in Budapest – when she receives an emergency call from Koller. She picks up immediately, hands tight on the joysticks. Adrenaline rushing high and, "Koller?"

"Malik- oh thank god-" his voice is high, thready. Strung tight with fear.

"Vaclav, what's wrong?" Malik was already throttling the engine for Prague. She could be there in under an hour if she pushed her VTOL to breaking, which she wasn't afraid to do.

"He's dying- he just walked in here and his chest was torn open and-"

"Kid, _slow down_. Who is?" It sounded like it wasn't Koller in danger, which was a relief. Despite the tightness in her chest at the adrenaline, her hands are loosening on the controls. The VTOL's engines don't scream as much.

"Jensen- he crawled in here with his chest torn open and his _Sentinel_ isn't working-"

The rush came right back. Her hands gripped the joysticks, she bit her lip, and her aug whirred as it strained with coiled movement.

"Malik, he's going to die-"

"What do you need?" She interrupts him. Could he even save him? They had to try. The dark countrysides of Europe roiled under her VTOL, the stars above weren't bright enough to be seen through the glow of her controls. She wasn't looking, anyway. Not now. Not with the threat of losing Icarus– Adam, who'd been sent into danger on _her word_.

"He needs a new Sentinel, but I don't have any, I've never had any-" They were hard to get. Especially with their military applications, the few remaining ones were locked up tight in high-security warehouses, available only to the richest patrons who needed them. Malik had never risked getting one for him, and Vaclav had never had a patient that needed one. He'd always been able to make do with other systems, Caidin or Tai Yong.

"How long has he got?" She turns the VTOL with a sharp whine, wing tip pointing straight at the ground as she changed course.

"Less than an hour- he was already almost dead when he got here, I don't even know how he got himself that far-" The sounds of rummaging on the other end of the line are wild and don't stop. "I might be able to trick the Sentinel into turning back on, but it won't last long."

"I'll be there. Keep him alive, Koller." She hangs up so she can make another call. No room for argument. No room for doubts. For failure.

A minute later and she's calling her import crew in Vienna. A smuggling ring whose loyalty she had earned when she saved their leader from a police raid for undocumented augs. She'd been passing through and had almost been picked up as well (considering Faridah Malik was legally dead in the United States and didn't exist elsewhere), which had led to her needing to fight back. What better way than to free the other zip-tied Augs and get help? She didn't even know who she'd rescued until after, when she asked where he wanted to be dropped off and he guided her to an abandoned industrial neighborhood by the river.

They knew all the underground connections she needed in Vienna, even throughout Austria – all she had to do was bring them a crate of parts, and they'd get them delivered to all her mechanics without any fuss. Instead of paying them, she let them have whatever extra parts she'd gotten that weren't on any mechanic's list of requested items. This? This was a long shot.

As soon as the call connects, she's speaking. "Tobias? It's Mal."

"Yes?" That was definitely him – mildly bored, but attentive. He didn't miss much, and he certainly would not have ignored how she skipped any niceties and moved straight to business. The Malik most of her contacts knew was chatty, friendly, and enjoyed a long conversation while flying. This Malik was usually only seen by those on the wrong side of her gun.

"I need to call in any and all favors I have there. You know the old Sarif warehouse, the one that supposedly isn't an aug warehouse at all? I need a Sentinel RX health system, and that's the most likely place there is one." She's already half an hour away from Vienna. If her contacts can pull this off, she will have to wonder how they haven't taken over the world yet.

"Mal, there's a reason we've never raided that place. High security, high profile, we'd be locked down for weeks with just the increased police activity after, even _if_ we got in." He sounds surprised – Malik never asked him for anything without offering something. Never asked anything he couldn't easily do. Maybe he doesn't have any contacts in that place, anyone to quietly open pass-locked doors.

"I need it in twenty-five minutes." Teeth worrying the inside of her lip. There were no other Sarif warehouses she knew of in close enough range between her and Prague. Too long and Adam would be dead. She refused to let that happen. Not without a fight. Not after everything he did for her. After he brought her leg back for little more payment than thanks. After he followed her across the continent and protected her from would-be assassins. After they became friends- were they? She'd like to think so. Regardless. She had to fight for him.

"Mal, there's no way-" Now he sounds plain incredulous. A little like he thinks she's lost her mind.

"My friend is dying and the only thing that will save him is a new Sentinel. I don't care who does the job, I don't care about any other parts. You can keep whatever else you find there. Just _get me a Sentinel_ and have it on the roof of the warehouse for me in twenty minutes. Please, Tobias." Malik does not beg. Even when they pressed a shotgun to her leg and told her to run back to her boss (ha, ha. As if there was a boss above her), she did not plead for her life. She spat at them and limped her plane across Europe and got herself home. She begs now. For someone else's sake.

"If this works, you will _owe_ me." She hears shouting – it sounds like Tobias is mobilizing his crew. Calling other crews. If they get enough people moving, it won't matter how high the security is.

"I saved your life and never collected the debt. We will be even." Some things were worth more than money – particularly to criminals. Part of the reason she never took a payment or some reward for saving him was just in case she needed something like this. A favor.

He clicks his tongue. "Fine. I expect to see you there."

"Thank you, Tobias." She's gunning for the city, for the warehouse. She'd hoped to save it for her own raid someday – so many nice Sarif parts would be there, and with Koller acting as Adam's mechanic, he'd need as many of them as he could get – but it was worth sacrificing any chance at it again if it meant saving Adam.

Tobias hangs up, and she calls Koller again.

"-Malik?" his voice cracks panicked and fearful.

"I'm working on getting a Sentinel. There's a warehouse in Vienna. How is he?" Calm and clipped, focused on pushing her VTOL to actually meet the twenty minute deadline she had set. If anyone could eke out extra speed from a plane, it would be her. Especially out of this bird – custom outfitted by herself, and personally taken care of. She'd changed her mind once she lost her leg and had a phoenix painted onto the top in a deep, dark red – no need to make it ostentatious and obvious, but enough to make a point. If you ran into this VTOL, you had better hope it wasn't gunning for you.

"I-I managed to get the Sentinel back on. It's stuttering and making some hellish screams-" He's interrupted by a screech of metal, and Malik just makes a small 'ah' sound. "It won't hold much longer. He's slipping." It's clear that this has shaken Koller, and Malik knows for a fact that he's had patients die on him before. When had Adam become important to him? Perhaps it was as simple as the moment he became a client – Koller cared about all his clients, and with augs like Adam's, it was no surprise that the punk immediately got attached.

"If my crew can get me the part, I'll be there in fifty minutes." Fifty minutes for a trip that should take an hour and fifteen. She'd have to make it work.

"I don't know if he has-"

"Make it happen, Vaclav." Firm, but not unkind. The kid was family to her, and her favorite mechanic – not that she would ever tell the others. After all he'd been through for _her_ , she felt awful he was going through it again. "Stay on the line with me. Keep talking. _Breathe_. You can do this, kid." Only he could do this. No one else.

He's laughing, nervous and shaky, and she has to wonder just how bloody and red his painted augs will be when she arrives. A moment's pause and, "Okay Malik. I- okay."

"Good."  
-

She reaches the warehouse and notes, with satisfaction, that while there are alarms going off inside the building, police have yet to arrive. Instead of slowing down and changing flight modes, she hits the brakes just above the building, and as she's dropping the engines angle downwards. At the last possible moment, she blasts them, lands on the roof with a thud. Fastest way down. Also the most dangerous, but if Faridah Malik didn't live for danger, then what did she live for?

The cargo doors are opening even as her plane is settling on the roof, and a young man is running on board with a crate.

"You've got it?" she notes the disbelief in her tone – when had she decided that it would be impossible to get? He pops the crate with a nod, shows her the brand new, glistening, alloy part. If she were anyone else, she might cry at the sight. Instead, she shuts the doors and is immediately taking off again. The man lurches into the copilot seat, holding the box tight as she rockets them back into a reasonable flight altitude.

It's obvious the man didn't expect to come along with her, but if Tobias hadn't clearly expressed how much time she _did not have_ , then that was his fault. "A-are you going to drop me off somewhere?" he asks, buckling the harness in just in case.

"No, sorry. I'll give you a ride back after this, okay?" she barely glances over at him, almost misses the star-struck expression he's wearing when he looks at her.

"Tobias didn't say the _Phoenix_ herself was coming-"

"That was smart of him," she answers with a wry grin. "The fewer people who know where I am, the better." The fewer bodies she had to leave behind.

She's blasting the engines straight for Prague, ignoring the fact that the straightest path was straight through police patrol zones. They'd have to be very lucky to avoid being noticed by any of the border guard drones. She didn't have time to take one of the less-watched routes.

"Malik," Koller's voice is in her ear again. High, panicked. "I'm losing him!"

"Hang in there, kid. I'll be there in twenty. I've got a Sentinel with his name on it."

" _Hurry,_ Malik."

"I am."

She hadn't heard Koller so shaken since, well, since she lost her leg. Since she stumbled, bleeding and dying, into his arms. It seemed like the only person she and Adam trusted in a situation like that was Vaclav. He had that air about him – that promise of trust. Help.

The lights of Prague are fast approaching under her, and she's steering for the district where Koller's shop was, when a drone appears on her radar. Demanding that she stop and land at the police station to be inspected for avoiding the proper cross-border channels. And what was her flight number? Why wasn't she flying on an authorized flight path?

She ignores the channel. Turns to her passenger.

"Vladimir, do you know how to fly?" He looks startled, grip loosening on the Sentinel's box.

"I…sort of? I mean, I could probably not crash- I've only flown a helicopter before." He pauses. "…You know my name?"

She's already unstrapping, passes control of the plane to the copilot seat and takes the crate from him. His hands are immediately on the controls as the plane stalls for a moment. "You're going to let the police stop you. Tell them you're a civilian plane and you'd been attacked back in the mountains and you were just trying to hobble back to town." She reaches under the dash and pulls a couple of wires. The police demands over the communications channel stop suddenly. "And that's why you couldn't hear what they were asking you. Flash an SOS at them with your lights." A pause. "Can you do that for me?"

"I- won't they shoot me down?" He's looking like he very much regrets being the one to hold the Sentinel when she showed up.

"They shouldn't. If they do, parachutes are on your right. If they arrest you, talk to Lenka. Tell her 'the firebird sends ashes' and she'll get word to me. I'll get you out. Just do this for me." She's stopped her movements to meet his gaze.

"O-okay. Yes. I can do this."

"Good boy. Thank you." She pats his shoulder, reaching for loose straps to lash the box to herself. "I don't forget the names of kids I pulled out of cops' hands." He looks up at her again, wide-eyed. She just grins.

"Wait- where are you going?" He realizes that he should probably have asked that much sooner. He'd gotten swept up in exactly what she had been asking him to do. What he had agreed to do. The amount of risk he was taking on just then.

"Express elevator to hell, going down." She laughs, pops the cargo door. "Close that before the cops see me – should help convince them you're malfunctioning." Waves a hand at him and dives out. If the stakes weren't so high, if the tension and fear wasn't coiled in her gut, if she wasn't so close to _losing_ Adam, she'd be enjoying the hell out of this.

As it is, the wind rips at her immediately, steals the breath from her lungs. She's glad she grabbed a pair of goggles, because now is not the time for bleary-eyed leisure diving. She watches the lights below her, trying to map out the roads as she'd been flying toward them. Now falling _at_ them. Hands on the box, making sure she'd lashed it to herself tightly enough. Luckily, she had. Gingerly, cautiously, pulls her arms away from it.

It stays attached.

She spots the metro station, and from there she's able to follow the roads to the dark spot that had to be the courtyard to Koller's shop.

"Malik, what is going on? What's that noise?" She supposes her InfoLink and neural chip couldn't actually filter out the screaming air from sky-diving. Good to know.

"Complication!" she shouts, the sound torn from her throat. She thinks the subvocalizer may have picked up on what she was trying to say. "Coming!"

"Are you…are you _not_ in your plane anymore?!" It sounds like he's now panicking about _her_ and not Adam, so that might be a good sign. Or a terrible one.

"Two minutes!" He'd better still be alive. That idiot couldn't die now. Not if she had anything to say about it.

She waits until she's at a dangerously low altitude to snap the flaps out on her wingsuit. It had been tricky roping the crate to herself without impeding on the flaps, but it seems she managed to not get too much in their way. She'd jumped without a parachute – no time to glide safely down. Every second counted.

She's spiraling above the courtyard, swooping in wider and wider circles, trying to slow down. Best bet, she gets _really_ lucky and sails through one of the second-story windows. Gets to the elevator and into the dungeon. Second-best, she lands in the courtyard without dying and takes the sewer entrance. Worst-case, she smacks into a wall or the ground at terminal velocity. Two dead augs instead of one. She'll take her chances. Trust her skill. She didn't spend all those afternoons with Evelyn diving back into planes mid-air for nothing. Not that she ever expected to use it like this. Trying to save the life of an assassin-turned-bodyguard who was supposed to protect _her_ life. Who…for some reason or another got himself nearly killed on a job that while important, she'd _stressed_ wasn't worth his life. They could always get another chance at finding out who was behind the attempts on her life.

Her entire view is city lights now, no longer able to see the edges of wilderness. One of the Palisade Blades arches over the sky to her right, level with her. Her spirals are getting wider, taking up the space of the entire courtyard. She's going to need to make sure her last spiral starts at the Time Machine and ends pointed straight at one of the windows. No time for fear or hesitation. Make the calculation, and make the move. She wasn't called the Phoenix for nothing.

The buildings are rushing up at her, and she's going far slower than she had been in total freefall. If she lands right, she might just bruise badly instead of breaking bones. That would be a plus. The trees of the courtyard glint in the low light, the ground wet with a recent rain reflecting the lights of the few lampposts.

She curves for that final spiral, and miscalculates.

Didn't plan for the crate's drag.

Her foot clips a tree, and her aim veers off. Past the window she'd been going for and towards the wall. She curls tight around the box and hopes the movement is enough to get her to the next window.

Her back slams into the edge of the window as glass shatters and she flies into the bookstore. Hits a bookshelf with her shoulder, which finally stops her momentum with a slide against old, worn carpet.

"Malik? _Malik?!"_ Koller's voice is loud in her ear. She groans, has to gather herself. Pulls her knees under her and stumbles to her feet.

Immediately pulling the crate off of herself, fumbling with the straps to make sure the aug had made it intact.

" _Malik_!"

"Yeah- yeah I'm here." The Sentinel is in one piece, and she almost sobs in relief. Runs toward the elevator in Koller's office. "Elevator." Pulls the book, hits the button, and rolls her flightsuit's flaps back into place while the elevator takes her down. The moment the doors open she's sliding through them, stumbles at the stench of blood and death.

Koller's arms are stained red with blood. His vest is a mess, dried blood and something else smeared brown across the chest, shoulders. He has a streak of wet blood on his forehead, probably from his arm. He's got his hands _inside_ of- of Adam. Adam's chest has been torn open, savaged. Like someone had set a rabid animal on him and told it to eat through him. Like someone had been _digging_ for something.

She snaps out of it, rushing forward and pushing the Sentinel into Koller's hands. He lets out a choked noise of relief, immediately moving. Now that she tears her gaze from Adam, she sees his old Sentinel, dented and partially smashed, sitting on the floor near the chair. Vaclav had pulled it out in preparation – either she showed up with a new Sentinel, or he was dead anyway.

Malik backs out of his space, gives him room to work. Stumbles against the countertop and realizes, with the crashing adrenaline, that she hadn't actually walked away from that landing with nothing but shortness of breath. Clamps down on a small whine as she slides down to the floor. Watches Koller work from there, unable to get up – there's a sudden, sharp fire in her back and shoulder – and unable to not watch.

Koller's elbow deep in Adam. Hands moving lightning quick, already tooled up, moving ravaged meat to get at the installation ports. Were those _ribs_ on the table next to him? Malik feels vaguely sick. Koller had been in this hell for an hour, _two_?

She hears the strained whirring of his augs as he clicks piece after piece of the Sentinel into place. Wiring it up. Hooking it in. Sarif augs were good, easy to install with ports designed for them, and if Adam hadn't been turned into an homage to Sarif augs, well. Adam was, if anybody, the best patient to need a Sentinel installed immediately.

Hands sunk into a body that's toeing the line between death and life, Koller makes one final twist and click. Stares for a few moments. Nothing happens.

Malik scrabbles for the counter above and behind her, straining to push herself back up. Back on her feet and she stumbles closer to see what the matter was.

"It's not- It's not turning on." Koller stares at it for another moment before coming to a decision. Wiping his hands carelessly on his shirt – it's already ruined, anyway – he moves quickly to a drawer, pulling a handful of cables out. Ignoring the conclusion that if the aug didn't turn on, it meant he was gone.

"What are you doing?" Malik is carefully out of his way, favoring the side that hadn't met a wall and a shelf already. Adrenaline made for a great painkiller, but she'd stretched it too far, too long. Running off it the moment she'd gotten the call.

"If it won't turn on from his own system, I'm going to try and make it turn on through mine." He's plugging cables into ports. The few remaining whole ones on his chest, a couple in his back. Vaclav pulls the other ends of the cables to his own skull plate, plugging them in effortlessly. Hesitates on the last one. "It's been a while since I've had to do this. It's- not going to be fun." Not even sure if he's telling Malik or bracing himself. He plugs the last cable in and immediately curls, letting out an agonized moan. He'd have dropped to the floor if he hadn't grabbed onto the arms of the chair, augs squeezing hard enough to dent the metal. Malik steps forward immediately, bracing him, taking his weight.

"Vaclav? Vaclav are you okay?" He's not. He's obviously not. Stupid question. She hopes it will bring him back though, give him something to focus on.

He laughs, something wet and shaky. Leans heavily against her as his hand reaches back into Adam, untwists a connection and fixes it. Resets it. "Please work." He's shaking, whimpering.

Silence.

A moment later, the Sentinel lights up with a slow whine. Koller sobs, immediately slumping against her. His left hand reaches backwards, stuttering, as he tries to unhook himself. Malik sees the movement and wrenches the cables out. She stumbles backwards as his legs give out and she crashes against the counter, the both of them sliding to the ground.

Koller's hands reach for his chest, searching. For the gaping hole that his body was _certain_ was there. That he'd _felt_. His augs are clattering, shaking, whining as they try to stabilize.

Malik grabs his hands, pulls them down. Ignoring the new pain in her back from hitting the counter, she just curls tight around him. "It's okay, Vaclav. You're okay. You're not hurt." She doesn't dare look up. Doesn't dare to see if it worked. Throat too tight.

He seems to realize this, leaning against her for a moment, not struggling against her hold. Icarus had come to him in that much agony. Had walked from god-knew-where with a malfunctioning Sentinel. With his chest torn _wide open_. Vaclav is re-evaluating all the reasons Icarus terrifies him. Adds this to the list. That blind will, _determination_ to live; Koller wonders where he got it.

There's a whine from the chair and Koller immediately stands, pulling himself out of Malik's grasp. The sudden movement, coupled with the ghost of that shared pain, makes him sick. He lurches to the drain in the floor and vomits. He picks himself up – he'd aimed it perfectly into the drain. How many times had he had to do that before, Malik wonders? He's checking systems, reaching for the bones on the tray – they _were_ ribs. Malik looks away before it makes her sick. Not the fact that they're someone's ribs (she's definitely seen those before. Cut them out to open air) but the fact that they're _Adam's_. The Sentinel whirrs loudly, working overtime. Pumping endorphins and expelling shrapnel. Convincing his body that it wasn't dead, that it needed to heal.

"I think. I think it worked." Koller is breathless. Staring down at Adam like he couldn't believe it. He'd outdone himself. Even this was something he'd thought beyond him.

Malik just laughs, leans her head back against the drawers. Her eyes slide closed, all of the energy and rush leaving her. Too exhausted to think of what might happen if Adam actually wakes up. She just wants to sleep at the moment, hopes she can knock out before the pain actually hits. At least she hadn't broken anything vital, considering she'd still been able to stand up.

"Malik, are you okay? I heard that crash when you were getting here." He turns to her, finally able to focus on something that wasn't just the fading heartbeat under his hands. That she's on the ground, not moving too much, alarms him.

"I…might have cracked something." Sheepishly admits. Stupid miscalculation had gotten her here. She was embarrassed, honestly. She was better than that.

"Here, here, at least come lay on my bed." He's bending over, offering her a hand. She takes it, and the leverage he uses to pull her up makes her groan. He places a hand on her back, pressure on the injury, pulling a soft, pained noise from her. She hopes it's just a deep bruise, that she didn't actually break anything.

"I swore I'd never sleep on that thing again," she grumbles, not resisting his guiding hand towards it regardless.

She kicks aside a discarded can of beer and almost trips on a box of nuts and screws on the way over. Ignores the toilet in the corner, as she always does, and just drops onto the mattress, letting Koller take most of the weight as he lowers her down. She makes a soft sound as she adjusts her position, laying on her uninjured side and curling up just slightly. Not a whine. Faridah Malik did not whine.

"Let me get you some aspirin. Stay awake for a few seconds for me?" He doesn't wait for an answer before he's moving to the other side of the dungeon, rooting around in a few drawers until he finds what he's looking for. Comes back with the pills and what's probably supposed to be a bottle of water, but the liquid is discolored and she decides she'd rather just take them dry. He hands them to her and she pops them into her mouth, sitting up so she doesn't choke.

"Vaclav, if I'm still sleeping when he's waking up – _wake me up_." She's looking warily over at Adam, frowning slightly. She had words for him. And…a realization. She'd never intended to _care_ so much, at all, about her bodyguard. They were supposed to be disposable. That he wasn't, and that he could get so close to death- she needed to do something about it.

"I get it, I get it Malik, don't worry. Just get some rest." His hands are shaking still and he wants nothing more than to curl up with her and try to put the horror out of his mind. But he has to keep an eye on Icarus, and watch out for Malik now too.

She's already asleep shortly after - the crash, and, whatever else she'd had to do to get that Sentinel probably weighed on her. Until she was left exhausted, barely carrying herself any further. Eerily similar to Icarus, dragging himself in here nearly dead. Vaclav ponders the thought, watching the two bodies sleep, one much more alive than the other. The assassin's body is working though – his lungs inhale, his heart is beating, and he would probably wake in a few hours.

Koller marvels at the sight as he uses a rag to get the blood off his augs. Digging into joints with a scalpel to pick out dried pieces. Very carefully not thinking about how he got all this blood over himself. A human should not have been able to lose so much blood and live, but Jensen seemed to exist just to defy expectations and spit on them as he hopped over yet another mysterious puzzle of just what made him tick.

He's peeling his clothes off, finding less bloody things to wear. It was not the best idea to wake Icarus up to the sight of copious blood. Nothing would get him into combat mode faster, and with his Sentinel working overtime to try and get him looking _human_ again, that would be a very bad idea. He tosses the bloodied clothes in a corner. Sets his coat to the side to try and salvage later. Any stains he couldn't remove would just have to get new patches over them, he supposes.

He pulls up a chair and sits once he's clean and settles in to watch over the both of them. Wonders just what it took for Malik to get that part. How he managed to keep Icarus alive for so long. What the assassin had gotten into that resulted in such damage in the first place. What storm of perfect luck resulted in them saving him. His augs still tremor at the phantom agony.

Knowing Malik, she'd want Jensen to think Koller just had a Sentinel lying around. Or, maybe she wants him to know _exactly_ what she went through to get it. She'd sounded upset. Furious. He wonders what he's missed to make her so. That Icarus nearly got himself killed? That she hurt herself to save him? Or that she worked so hard to of her own volition. Was so desperate to save him. For her own sake and protection, or for something else? He thinks he's skirting a little too close to the truth, and leaves it at that.

Vaclav watches Icarus' chest knit itself together into the morning, his eyes heavy and tired but unable to sleep. Not while a client…almost a friend, but not quite, sits there in his chair so injured. He'll just trade places with Malik when she and Icarus both get up. Realizes suddenly he has something to fix about his shop – Malik had crashed _somewhere_ on her way in, hadn't she? He'd figure it out later. After sleeping. Which was a ways off yet.

Somehow, Vaclav managed to doze off. He only knows this because Icarus makes a noise and Vaclav is suddenly awake where he hadn't been. Bolting out of the chair – a slight stumble, sleep-drunk – and moving to the assassin's side. His chest looks almost fully healed, skin shiny and stretched new.

"Jensen?" He'll wake Malik in a second, if he's actually waking up and not just…coming back to life unconscious.

Icarus groans something in response.

"Heyyy, there you are. Let me get you a coffee started, okay?" He backs off for a moment to start the machine, and moves to gently shake Malik awake. She jerks startled and then flinches at the pain from moving, sitting up fast and searching for danger. "Hey, hey, Mal, it's fine. Jensen's waking up."

The smell of fancy espresso starts to fill the dungeon and hover over the stench of unwashed blood. Vaclav would never have bothered to buy something so nice, but Icarus had not-so-subtly given him this bag of beans and made it quietly clear that he should tell him when he ran out. Vaclav felt bad drinking it – surely the assassin didn't know how much coffee he drank – so he only brewed it when the augmented masterpiece was around.

Malik glances over at Adam, at his nearly whole chest, and sighs in relief. Her hand tentatively reaching for her back, feeling out the injury and breathing slow to check how hurt she is. Not too awful, but it would ache a while. Nothing compared to what Adam went through. But he'd be right as rain soon and she'd feel this a while. Maybe she should look into getting a Sentinel sometime, too.

"When'd you get such nice coffee, kid?" she asks, standing gingerly. Trying to gather the will to be angry when all she feels is an aching relief at seeing Adam...mostly whole. Alive. Still breathing.

"He said my coffee tasted like rat's piss and week-old blood." Vaclav shrugs, a little helplessly. "I mean…he's not wrong, buuuut it wakes me up?"

"I'm glad someone was finally able to tell you the truth about that shit." She limps for the coffee machine, slow inhales, slow exhales. Checking the time and reaching for her pocket, pulling out a…broken vial of neuropozyne. Sighing, and holding it up for Vaclav to see. "You got any extras?"

"Oh, _shit,_ of course, of course yeah I always do," moving quick for a drawer that she would not have searched on her first, second, or fifth try looking for nupoz around here. He digs through a wrench and some envelopes – why does he have envelopes? Do people still send mail? – and pulls out a new box.

He tosses her one and she checks the expiration on it just in case. Knowing him, it might have been a _first edition_ case, or, long past expiry. It wasn't. She takes a dose and reaches for the first cup of coffee coming off the machine, sliding another mostly-clean cup under and pushing the button for another shot. Drinks it in one long gulp and Vaclav just makes a noise, hand waving at Adam like 'that was _his_ '. He could wait. He wasn't even awake yet and she very much was.

"…I'm going to fire him." She finds herself murmuring suddenly, the empty coffee cup held in her hand, almost limply now that it had served its purpose.

"You're- _what_. Mal, did you hit your head?" Vaclav is too exhausted, he must have misheard. Misunderstood. He's missing something here, some piece of this tangled monstrosity.

"Just my shoulder. And back." She sets the cup down and sighs, heavy.

"Mal-" a pause. " _Faridah_. That's crazy. You just saved him-"

"That's the _point_ , isn't it?" Her hand scrubs over her face, nails in her scalp and shifting hair now that it had nothing to hold. "I almost died to save him. I was reckless and I was _ready_ to." The heel of her hand digs into an eye. "That's not how this is supposed to be."

" _So_?" Vaclav takes the next cup of espresso the moment it's ready, sliding a third cup under. Takes a note after her – he needs it more than Adam does at the moment. Drinks it straight down, too rushed for the worth of those beans but he needs to be certain he's actually hearing this….this insanity.

"I can't have a bodyguard I _won't let die_ , Vaclav!" she's certain of this, now. Walking across the room in determined strides, shoving the pain down to deal with later, reaching for Adam's coat. Digs into it, into the pocket she saw him put their contract into months and months ago and yanks it out. Her lips narrow into a thin line when she sees its bloody, stained and nigh-unreadable.

She's right about this. Her life isn't worth Adam's. He'll be fine. Without her he won't be in so much danger. He can go back to being the underground's favorite intrigue, the assassin everyone is craving to hire. He can go back to watching his own back and no one else's. She's folding up the contract so it'll fit into her flightsuit and as she turns back she glances at the chair.

Adam's eyes are open. And he's staring right at her. She shoves the papers into the pocket and zips it harshly, hears the metal catch on paper and she doesn't even care, then. Distantly, she hears the elevator. Vaclav had made a quick escape, then. She doesn't blame him. The weight of Adam's gaze on her is heavy.

"Fari-" he starts to say, voice a thick rasp.

"You're fired." She says, cuts him off. Easier to be quick about it. Cold. He was just a tool that she didn't need any more. The lie sits uneasy in her but she tries to make herself believe it.

He doesn't say anything, though his lips are parted slightly, still caught on her name. The sound dying in his throat, unfinished.

"You're welcome to keep using my network. Stay here until you're better." Pulling a jacket off the wall, one of Vaclav's – he wouldn't mind, he didn't wear any of them anyway.

Adam is silent. This, for some reason, both infuriates her and solidifies her resolve. She'd gotten used to his silence. It hadn't pissed her off since that first time she'd met him, and even then it was just a mild annoyance.

And yet, she falls into the trap anyway. His silence makes her speak, as it always has. "You didn't listen to me. I _ordered_ you to not risk your life for that mission." She doesn't even care why he did anymore. Why he got caught. What almost cost him his life. She's mad at herself, for believing the illusion he put out that he was invincible. "I don't need you."

Maybe she does. But she got by without him before. She'd get by without him now.

"Goodbye, Icarus."

She leaves through the sewer.

Vaclav comes back once he's put a board over the broken window – he'll deal with the floor covered in books later and is. Startled to see the dungeon almost as he left it. Jensen is still in the chair, the coffee mug is still under the machine, and. And Faridah is gone.

"What-" he's immediately trying to call her, but she doesn't pick up. And then he thinks he should maybe make sure Icarus is still breathing, because the coffee's gotten cold and he hasn't moved-

The assassin sits up, then, and Vaclav sighs in relief.

"What happened?" he chugs the cold coffee and puts another one on, knows Adam will prefer it.

"She left," is all he says. In his usual unreadable tone, and honestly, Vaclav wonders if anyone can read him. Maybe Malik could have.

Vaclav doesn't say anything until he's got a coffee to press into Jensen's hands. Looking over him as he does, making sure he's still healing. At least that's going properly.

"She almost died to bring you a Sentinel," he finally says, quiet. Remembers the sound of roaring wind and that deafening crash, echoed in his infolink and upstairs. Any worse and she would've hit the wall.

Icarus grunts, and tips the coffee back. Not in the mood to savor it either, then. He sets it down on the tray that held his ribs a few hours earlier and moves to stand and Vaclav is immediately moving to push him back down.

"Woah _woah_ , you were basically dead a few hours ago, you're not going anywhere-" Vaclav actually has to use his strength augmentation to keep him down, but it works and the assassin frowns hard as he's pushed back onto the chair. Which really just went to show how much Vaclav was right because Icarus could have shoved him off anyway at normal capacity. "She'll be back," he reassures. Doesn't know if he's reassuring himself or Jensen. Probably both, he thinks.

He looks like he's going to try and get up again.

"I shut off most of your augs-" Vaclav says quickly. The rapid snap of Icarus' glare to him is both a relief and a terror. "I had to- you were going to die and they kept _screaming_. I'll fix them as soon as you finish healing." The words tumble out in a rush. Even with his weapons off he could kill Vaclav as easily as breathing, and the mechanic's hands are up non-threateningly.

The assassin groans and drops his head back. Vaclav thinks he may be safe. For now.

Malik does not go back. Vaclav will be alright – he has Pritchard he can call if he needs to, and Adam. Will also be fine. She's sure of it. Safer and better off than if he were watching over her.

She returns from the next gala with her white aug spattered scarlet.


	13. Snowblind

_I don't need you._

When he hears those words, they twist strangely, settle sharp between his ribs. He wonders why it feels like the knife that had so directly aimed for his Sentinel, carved deep and personal.

The hard look in her eyes wavers, and he realizes she can see his eyes. The frown, the furrow of his eyebrows, and most of his augs are offline and she's-

Gone.

He has half a mind to follow her – the other half to let her do as she pleases – but Vaclav gets in the way.

He recovers to Vaclav's standards by the next afternoon – though he'd long been well enough to leave, Vaclav kept making wounded looking puppy faces at him, and he instead focused on making sure no one had seen him limp his way to the bookshop.

He runs a test of his software, hacking augs by getting into the security cameras and going back through the logs to the night it happened. He pretends to doze off in a chair while he reviews the footage. He watches himself barely get through the door before collapsing, and listens to the accompanying infolink audio files. Vaclav's panicked call, Malik's determination. She called in _all_ of her favors in Germany for him.

He hears the wind whistle as she jumped out of her plane, and while the sound is familiar to him, she has no Icarus landing system. The crack and crash of her landing almost pulls a reaction from him, but Vaclav is too distracted in his tablet to notice. That explained the slightly off gait she'd walked out with. And what Vaclav meant by 'she almost died to bring you that.'

He should have called her as soon as he'd escaped, given her more time to get the part. His Sentinel had still been functioning then. He'd had faith that Vaclav could fix it.

He thinks back to what had gotten him caught. The pocket secretary he'd found that led him to a computer that led him to a name he knew. A name that filled him with some cocktail of dread and guilt and he'd overextended. It was only his experimental and highly dangerous augs that let him escape once they had their claws in him, _ripping_ –

Adam is tempted to go and finish the job. Just because he'd been fired from bodyguard duty didn't mean he couldn't kill the target that was either behind most of the annoyances he'd been dealing with over the past half year or had someone even more powerful pulling the strings.

 _I don't need you._

He'd let her go. If she was so certain, then she could do just that.

Icarus had put off a few assassinations he'd been interested in taking, anyway. More people whose banks and bodies he could bleed dry, more instability he could seep into the dark bricks that kept organized crime afloat.

He can't stop his curiosity, though. He watches the next gala remotely, a ghost in their security system, wondering if she really will stand up to what she'd told him. One of the other guests attempts to kill her – broadcasted his intentions too clearly, moved from the side instead of behind, and brandished a weapon – and she shatters his leg with a sped up kick, slams a knife in his gut, and reaches for a drink from a passing waiter all in one motion. He dies slowly as she walks away, and Adam is impressed despite himself. This is not the same Malik he knew. He'd taught her some things just in case he'd been away, but clearly she'd been working at it in the interim.

That is not the only incident of bloodshed that evening, and she walks away unscathed and unbothered. Or so it appears, to this security camera by the exit.

Malik is, for once, _finally_ , relaxing with a book on her couch, when she gets a call through from Pritchard. She puts the book down.

"Mal?"

"What's up, P?" she sits up. He sounds…anxious. It took a lot to get Pritchard riled up, and she was still in one piece so it wasn't her fault this time.

"Sarif knows."

The words are like a stone disturbing a still pond.

"Knows…what?" she almost doesn't want to ask.

"That you're alive. And who you are."

That explained the lack of celebratory reaching out from the CEO.

"He's not happy, is he." She's still sifting through what this means, what she has to do about it.

"No. He hasn't gone public with the information yet, for some reason, but I've seen outgoing requests to start…'putting pressure' on you."

" _Fuck_." She could evade, she could hide, but her networks were not so mobile. If the police started going for anything relating to the phoenix, if they went after her mechanics' _clients_ …

"I don't…have any evidence, but. Mal, only three people knew your name." Himself. Vaclav. Adam.

 _Adam_.

Would he? Had she pissed him off so royally by firing him that he'd decided he'd rather her entire mission crumble than kill her personally? Maybe he'd never been fired before.

"See if it could've been anything else."

"What, not even a moment of concern for your hacker who's in the same country as Sarif?" The typing is a quiet background noise to their conversation, and it makes her think she really needs to start making plans. Dissolution, hibernation, and survival plans, for all her contacts. What to do if she disappeared, how to survive until she came back.

"I'm pretty sure that even if Sarif took down my whole web, you'd be the last one he found."

"You're not wrong…"

"Be careful anyway." A small smile turns the corner of her lip upward, and he snorts in derision over the line.

"Now you're just faking it."

"You'll never know." She'd stick her tongue out if this were a vidcall, playful despite the grim news because how else could she get moving? Despair wouldn't be helpful.

"I know everything."

"Sure, _snake_. Thanks for the tip."

"Anytime – as long as it pays the bills."

She hangs up on him. She has work to do.

The attempts on her life don't stop just because Adam is gone, though thankfully she's lost most of the ones who were doing it to make a name. A smuggler killed without a legendary bodyguard isn't really something to put on a resume of successful kills, for which she is very grateful.

It's been a year since she fired Adam, and she only notices the time has passed by the fact that winter blankets the continent again. Crisp white snow reflecting the city lights and muffling everything. Muffling her thoughts on the fact. She hadn't heard anything from him, and she doesn't know if she's avoiding him, he's avoiding her, or both.

It's been six months since Sarif found out she's alive, and Pritchard hadn't been lying. The man had been trying to make her life hell, and where the assassination attempts had lessened, the police interference had multiplied. A few of her mechanics had dropped out of her network from the pressure, and she'd stopped stamping phoenix wings on her augs to let those who needed her help most stay under the radar.

They'd even arrested her, once. Of course, they'd taken her to a station where she new the chief personally, because she'd brought his seven-year-old girl a new pair of lungs, and he'd 'accidentally' misidentified her and let her go. But it was a good warning nonetheless. She had to be more careful.

She's returning home form a pickup of Sarif parts – a whole crate, and she'd personally assisted in the actual break in – when her thoughts stray back to Icarus. She hadn't slept as well after he'd gone, almost like she'd gotten…used to him being around. She wonders how he always slept so light, stayed so alert, _constantly_. It's draining, always looking over her shoulder, analyzing every single person in her view. Maybe he had augs to help with it, but that still required some incredible diligence.

She wonders who he used to be, before he picked up killing for fortunes.

Maybe there wasn't that much to it. Maybe he was just a mercenary. Somehow that doesn't fit right.

She'd spent the whole flight there and half the raid telling herself she wasn't getting these parts _just_ for him, but some small part of her hoped he still used her mechanics. Pritchard hadn't been able to find anything pointing Adam to speaking with Sarif about her identity, but she still…

Well. She was undecided.

But just because he was fired didn't mean he didn't have a lot of money to throw at her very-much-in-need mechanics. He could pay for the work now, she'd told them all to demand he do so.

Her radar lights up with a police warning a moment before two bouts of fire appear in her cockpit, streaking towards her plane. She twists sharply, and it's just enough to avoid the missiles aiming straight for her.

Or. Mostly. The whole plane rocks with the impact of one of them into her left jet. She braces, pumps more power into the other one to try and keep herself mobile, swerving away from another attack. She fires back at them, trying to escape, but with black smoke trailing behind her she'll have to think of something else.

The decision is made for her when the plane jerks hard again, the other engine whining sharp and pleading. A quiet curse to herself and she jams the stick back as hard as she can, giving herself as much time as possible.

She's unbuckled in an instant, racing for the back of the plane, grabbing a chute as she passes – she'd learned her lesson thank you, no more walls, please. A night chute, black to help her hide. As she's throwing it on, she grabs a wrench and pries open the box of augments. Digs in one-armed, pulling out a handful – a few spare parts, a couple of fingers, two eyeballs. Small, expensive, but at least _something_.

Malik slaps a small tracker on the inside of the box before closing it again, popping the bay door and shoving the crate out. Fuck her if she let these guys have free augs on top of everything else.

They'd been labeled as police, and maybe Sarif's efforts were paying off, but far more likely it was someone else masquerading. Easy enough to pretend to be official authority, when all you needed was the right paint and the right frequency. Police should have given her more warning before opening fire.

She raises two fingers to her lips, kisses them and presses the fingers to the inside wall. "I'll miss you, girl." This bird had been by her side for so much, she'd even managed to get her hands back on it after leaving it with Vladimir – who had somehow convinced the police that the painting on his roof was actually a _peacock_ , not a phoenix, and he was really a civilian plane. She'd have to get him on her crew someday.

The Phoenix leaps, and doesn't look back.

The wind whistles in her ears, and she pulls her arms wide in a snap, unfurling the flaps in her wingsuit. The sudden wind resistance buffets her, and she rolls just for the hell of it. Her first real dive since she'd been strapped to a box of an aug, and it felt so much nicer to have free range of all her limbs. She makes sure to drift as far as she can from her plane, diving fast.

Not far enough to avoid watching the explosion as her plane dives into the ground. She doesn't miss the flames licking up the wings, one broken off and the other lit in this eerie glow. The phoenix afire, and she swears that won't be her too.

She turns away, seeking a target, the direction closest to a city, and misses the next impact of something hitting the ground.

When she's three hundred feet above ground, almost too close, she pulls her chute, and the snap of it picking up as much air as it could is almost enough to slow her fall perfectly into the field she'd been aiming for-

She'd waited a heartbeat too long to pull, and crashes into a tree instead.

She was very glad there was no one here with her, suddenly. She drops from the tree, unbuckling her harness, and while she'd much rather there be no proof _anyone_ jumped from the plane, she doesn't have time to climb up and get it.

Malik lands roughly on the ground, rolling her shoulder and straightening up.

Her breath fogs in the air, and she wishes she'd grabbed a jacket too on her way out.

A northern European forest in the dead of winter, and the nearest city lights she'd seen had been almost on the horizon from ground level. Well, it was a good thing Vaclav had given her a weaponized heater. She could always just curl up around her leg and stay warm.

After she got away from all this. She was more than certain that whoever had shot her down wouldn't be satisfied with just the exploded plane. They'd want to make sure she had been in it too, and she's not as far from the crash site as she'd have liked. They'll have come prepared with infrared goggles – no wonder there hadn't been any attempts on her until winter had fully set in.

She wonders how long this has been planned for.

She walks quietly, arms crossed and her hands shoved up near her armpits. Made for harder walking but she'd rather keep her fingers. She'd turned on the leg heater a while back, hoping the warmth would seep into her thigh and from there into the rest of her.

She only realizes the heat moves outward too when her next footstep sinks deeper than her right foot goes. She must have warmed up her boot too. Maybe she'll ask Vaclav later if he can give her a heater setting that only channels upward.

Half an hour passes before she hears distant shouting, and she hopes that it's just them finding her chute and not her footprints. She picks up the pace regardless, uncrossing her hands and reaching for her gun. She hopes they don't have snowshoes.

They do. Of course they do. Or she thinks they do, since she hears something closer now, not a voice but noise regardless. They'll catch up to her soon at this rate and has to change plans. She walks a little further, snapping a branch as she goes, and then doubles back at a small creek, erasing her new footprints as she does and hiding further back. She doesn't like the thought of being surrounded, but it's that or take however many are following her head-on and that sounds worse.

Malik crouches by a large bush, leaning against a tree and she covers her mouth, keeps her breath from fogging into the open air. They don't pass too close by, but she hears one say "Where the hell is he?"

They'd gotten this close to her, planned so much, and didn't even know she was the Phoenix? How was that possible?

"Whatever," says another one. "The tracks end here. Fucker can't've gone far."

"Yeah, alright. Priming."

 _Priming_? She should've gone farther. If she's about to explode because of some ground-bomb when she had gotten this far-

A crackle of blue fills her- well it's not her sight but she _feels_ it. Her neural augs flicker and die, and her leg goes dark, the heat leeching out of it suddenly. She bites down a curse – they'd been priming an _EMP_ field. They knew she had an augmented leg. She was trapped.

So who was the _he_?

A gunshot rings out, a thud, and she's hauling herself up. She'd limp on her dead leg if she had to, but if someone was opening fire she needed to get _gone_. She pulls out a knife too, braces it under her gun, and hobbles away from the source of the noise.

There's another shout, of recognition, a triumphant snarl, and she's turning to fire first-

Another gunshot cracks and-

Electric gold crackles from the corner of her vision and slams into her hard. The force of it carries her into a tree, her cheek grinding against bark and she lashes out at it with her knife. Her blade slides off against metal, sparks falling and she can't see, she's pinned against the wood and one of her legs isn't working-

A growl cuts into her ear. " _Faridah._ Quiet."

Her body betrays her mind and _relaxes_ despite the fact that Adam _fucking_ Jensen is pinning her to a tree and she hears his glass cloak engaging. What the _hell_ was he doing here?

"I _fired_ you. Let go of me," she snaps, trying to twist out of his grip and his hands are on her arms, gripping them tightly, and they're _freezing_. She hisses through her teeth.

"Means I don't have to listen to you. _Quiet_." His chest is pressed solidly against her back, and she feels his body armor dig into her shoulder blades, gritting her teeth.

Indignation flares up in her chest, but the sound of a shout is enough to make her stop fighting him.

"Icarus?" the voice calls and…huh. Maybe he _was_ here to kill her.

"Yup." The assassin answers, the 'p' popping from his lips, shifting fluidly as the glass cloak disengages and she hears the all-too-familiar sound of a nanoblade as it launches toward his target. The man crumples with a gurgle and Adam lets go of her suddenly.

She stumbles away, her leg still a dead weight, clutching her gun tightly, knuckles white. He'd knocked away her knife, and she's staring him down, unsure. Of what he's going to do. Why he's here.

"If you wanted me dead, you could have just come and done it yourself. You didn't have to tell Sarif." She starts with that. See his reaction. If she was going to die at least she'd have this one mystery solved.

His brow furrows in what she'd learned to be mild confusion, maybe annoyance. Like he doesn't know what she's talking about. "Sarif?"

" _Yeah_. He knows my name. Only three people had that information."

He puts the pieces together quickly enough. "You think _I_ told _Sarif_?" He doesn't bother hiding the incredulity in his tone.

"Where else would he get it?" It's an honest question. Because if it wasn't Adam, she has a much bigger problem.

"I would rather see that man _burn_ than give him any modicum of _help_ and you think-"

"Then why are you here?" Her arms relax, the gun pointed downward and held loosely. Really, she'd only been holding it so tight on instinct, as if she'd be able to do anything against Adam and his TITAN shield. She ignores how strange her voice sounds. A weight behind the words she hadn't been aware she was carrying.

For what it was worth, the question seems to stall him. He doesn't answer, as if there's more than one answer to her question and he's choosing which.

"A hit." He finally says.

"On me?" If Icarus was working with them, then no wonder they had EMP fields ready, infrared goggles, snow shoes. He would oversee an operation so prepared. So why did he shoot them?

He doesn't answer, but the silence is answer enough.

"And you killed your coworkers becauseeee…" she really has no idea on that one.

"If I hadn't taken the job they were going to put a bomb on your plane."

Huh.

They'd thought he was deadlier, and he'd…proven to be the opposite? So far, anyway.

She sighs. Stows her gun so she can cross her arms again and try to warm them up.

"Why do you care?" there's that heaviness again. She almost sounds…despondent. Why does this bother her so? She should take advantage of it and run, not try and figure out _why_.

He doesn't answer her, his gaze snapping off to the distance, and she's reminded that they are very much not alone in this forest. He glances in the other direction, the one she'd been heading in, and she starts moving before he says anything.

Whatever. He'd do as he pleased, that much was clear. She'd get out of the EMP field and she'd jam a biocell into her leg to kickstart it and either he'd kill her or he wouldn't. It wasn't worth tangling her mind up over.

Faridah walks. And Icarus follows.

They walk in silence, the snow crunching under their feet, and Malik hates that he won't speak, won't answer her question.

Eventually, he disappears. Takes off in a flash of gold, and she's… _relieved_. If he's not here she doesn't have to keep asking herself why he won't say anything.

She's also tired of walking, tired of being cold. She'll just curl up by one of these big trees and curl around her leg until she can feel her hands again. She'll call Vaclav and have him reach out to her nearest crew and have them pick her up.

Icarus will either come back and kill her or he won't. She's done trying to calculate what he's going to do next.

She drops against the roots of a great old tree, leaning her back away from it and into the wind, and curls tight around her leg. Her hands on it feel like _heaven_ , like the warmth of a mug of tea in her window, hands wrapped around it and home. She presses a cheek to her knee, sighs in relief and soon turns her head to rest the other cheek against it.

Slowly, she thaws.

The forest is still, quiet and dead around her, and no one appears. Neither her hunters, nor the assassin.

She closes her eyes.

What feels like hours later, a sparking dash jerks her awake. She stays still, unmoving, wondering despite herself.

He rounds the corner, she hears his footfalls despite the aug silences – the snow still crunches, after all – and she hears a sharp inhale. "Malik?" Is that…concern?

She deigns him a glance with only one eye, the other still closed in warm bliss against her leg. Honestly, how was he not cold with that many augs? They should all have been leeching heat from him, unless each individual one had an internal heater. Maybe they did.

He moves suddenly, and she tenses, bracing herself. His coat is off and before she can comprehend he's draping it over her shoulders and trying another "Fari-"

And it's _too much_. She can't take this. Her feet against the root and she slides herself backwards, out of his reach and the coat slips out of his grasp over her, warm despite it all and-

" _Why._ Are. You. Here?"

His hands drop to his sides, crouching a mere few feet away from her, this living weapon who had devoted himself to protecting her, had almost died for her, and had just as easily left.

He's certainly smart enough to know that 'because you're the only real Sarif supplier' isn't going to cut it. No one was that reliant on a single supplier, not anyone who wanted to live long. There's something else at play.

Finally, he shifts. His shades flick open, almost like an olive branch extended, and. He inhales slowly. "Because it's my fault you died in the first place."

Faridah Malik is well and truly lost. "What?" It's the barest sound, and the only way she knows she even spoke it aloud is the accompanying puff of breath into the frost-bitten air.

He has the audacity to _sigh_. "When Sarif hired me, he hired me to be his chief of security, but mostly to find out who was stealing from him. I had a few suspects, but you were a likely candidate. I looked into your flight plan and knew you'd be going into danger but I didn't warn you. I thought you'd bail and your employer would hide you away. When…." He pauses and she wonders why she didn't remember _any_ of this when she first learned his name. Why hadn't it rung any bells? Had she just never met him? Maybe she'd deliberately stayed out of his way, skittish and nervous, afraid to be found out.

"When you didn't come back, I thought I was right. And then they found your plane."

She's brought back to her other question. Why does he care? Why hadn't he washed his hands of her then? She says nothing, feels like if she interrupts he'll never start again.

"I knew I had sent you to your death. And even if I was right in the end…it wasn't worth it."

Malik feels like she can't put the pieces together as fast as he's laying them out.

"I told myself I wouldn't do that again. If I found you, I wouldn't be the reason you died."

And he almost had been, again. He'd done something to piss her off enough that she fired him and then she almost got killed who knew how many times in the interim when he could have been there.

"Why me?" she crosses her arms, looking at him warily. It didn't make sense. "You have no qualms killing others." It is not an accusation, just a statement of fact. She is the same.

"You're different," is his only answer.

Helpful.

"You don't even know why I fired you, do you?" It's a quiet realization, a reminder of the fact that she still carries his contract in her pocket, hadn't been able to set it down. She had no idea what kept drawing her to him, but she ignored it as best she could and just…kept the damn paper.

"I ignored orders," he answered, like it was obvious, an eyebrow raised. The expression is aching in its familiarity and yet she feels like the mere feet between them is a gaping canyon's maw.

" _No,"_ she snaps. "Because my life isn't _worth_ yours!"

The silence hangs in the air, as brittle as the leaves on the tree above them. Waiting to be shattered.

"Oh." A soft exhale.

She stares hard at him, trying to read him now more than ever, and he just looks at her like he's…stunned. Like she dealt him a blow he wasn't even expecting.

For a moment, she thinks he's about to say something else, but a rustle in the distance catches both their attention, and he stands suddenly, offering her his hand. Arm outstretched, palm up, the black metal glinting in the low light of the night, the only light sources the moon filtering through the leaves and her leg beneath.

An offer.

She hesitates for a single heartbeat, before reaching up and clasping it, letting him pull her up. Just what this was, she didn't know, but.

Maybe there was something here.

Something that kept bringing them into each other's orbit. Drawing them into this spiraling dance where neither knew what the other was thinking but thought that…maybe it was the same.

That maybe they should stick together.


	14. Reconnect

They walk side by side, Icarus half a step behind, and he refused to take his coat back. It drapes over her shoulders and she feels the warmth seep into her bones, and it answers the subtle question – there's warmth in the shoulder and arms too, his augs must be heated. He's left in his combat vest, his guns hanging from his shoulder harness in the open, the black augs glinting low in the moonlight. Their feet crunch through the snow, through the otherwise still forest, and she wonders if he'd left any alive or he's just wary about reinforcements coming to find them.

"You know," she eventually says, just to break the silence, to feel like it hasn't been a _year_ since she last saw him. "when you first agreed to work for me, I just thought you were highly devoted to the metaphor." A sideways glance towards him, ignoring how her hands are curled into his coat to keep them warm. The only frostbite he had to worry about was his _nose_ , the lucky bastard.

"The metaphor?" he raises an eyebrow at her, the one that says he's _humoring_ her.

"Icarus needs some fiery thing to chase. There's no one with a Sun moniker in Europe, so I figured you settled for the next best thing." There's a smile pulling at the corners of her lips, and she marvels at how… _easy_ it was to get back into the groove of having him around. She doesn't even know if he's planning on _staying_ , for fuck's sake.

"You thought I chose a job because your _emblem_ fit mine."

She snorts at the utter disbelief in his tone. "Yeah I mean, what _else_ did you give me to go on?"

"Let me get this straight. You heard of a new assassin and you sought him out, despite thinking he was trying to kill you, and asked him to work for you. And when he said yes, and then stuck around, you assumed it was because of a _metaphor_."

"Yeah that sounds about right." She's holding back a laugh as she says it. He's looking at her like he can't believe she's telling he truth here.

"You really are something else," he huffs. She can't hold back her laugh, then.

"So I'm told." A wider smirk. "More often than you might expect."

He shakes his head at her like, no, really not. Perhaps even less than he might think she does.

Its then that Malik realizes her infolink still isn't working, despite the biocell she'd used earlier. Frowning. She'd expected it to boot back up after leaving the EMP field, and that it still hasn't is worrying. Until then, she…honestly hadn't noticed. Had been busy falling back into what she'd had with him before. It shouldn't have been so easy. She's still mad at him, dammit.

She reaches a hand up to rub at her forehead, like she can massage it into working again. Icarus notices the movement. "Is your infolink working? Mine won't start and Vaclav is going to lose his shit in about ten minutes if I don't call and tell him everything is fine. He may already be losing his shit if my plane is on the news."

Adam Jensen has the decency to look _sheepish_ about that, which makes her think he is very much to blame for the EMP field.

"Thought you used a biocell to bring it back?" his voice rumbles in the quiet dark, a sound like it belongs in this frozen forest.

"Yeah. It's not behaving." She thinks if it wasn't so cold, she might have a headache from it. Small mercies, she supposes. She realizes asking him to call Vaclav is tantamount to asking him to stay. Wonders if he will. "Can you call him? He needs to know I'm stuck regardless."

The assassin doesn't say anything, only glancing at her before looking at the trees above them. She assumes he's calling.

Eventually, he speaks. "the Phoenix sends her regards-"

She interrupts him before the last word leaves his mouth, "You make it sound like I'm _dead_ -" and the smirk on his face tells her that Vaclav must be saying something similar-

"And also that she's stuck with a dead infolink in Poland."

It silences her, but she glowers at him anyway to get her point across.

"I can send you coordinates, but we're still moving." A pause. "Sure."

It seems he's hung up, since he's looking at her now.

She just huffs, instead of saying anything. Glances skyward like he had, notices the spattering of stars filtering through frozen leaf canopies. More stars than she's used to seeing in the cities she frequents, and she doesn't often stop in the middle of nowhere to appreciate them. She thinks she should, maybe. She can feel Adam's eyes on her, and she wonders what he's thinking.

She wonders if he wants to stay.

"Koller say anything of note?" she asks, ignoring the question she _really_ wants answered.

"That you should call him as soon as your infolink works."

"I mean I figured that much was obvious."

There's an ache in her chest, something close to the cold bite of the air in her lungs. Cracks through her ribs and strung tight around her throat. She can't figure out what it is. Some mixture of longing and fear and a knowledge that she broke this in a way she's not sure how to fix.

"Think we're far enough away to stop 'till morning? I think I can feel frost in my boot." She sees a large tree bowed over sharply, thinks it might make a nice shelter. She'd kill for a fire.

"Sure," he answers. She wonders if that's a _yes_ or an _I'll make sure we are_. Doesn't mind much either way. She's immediately moving over to the tree and clearing the snow with her feet, making room for a fire. She doesn't care if the light or the smoke gives them away she needs a fire before she forgets how it feels to be warm.

Through some mixture of pressing twigs to her heated leg – Adam is doing the same, she thinks – they get enough wood dry to the minimum it needs to catch. The fire starts small and Malik is all but putting her hands palm-flat onto the smoldering wood.

The first time the fire crackles, Malik startles, which makes Adam look a bit more rigid, before they both realize it was just the fire. He snorts to himself, _at her_ , _as if she didn't have a reason to be on edge_ , as he stacks some larger branches along the outside of the fire to dry while the ones in it burn. She just revels in how his coat actually seemed to stop the wind straight on, and how much warmer she is since he forced it over her shoulders.

The silence is made all the more deafening by the intermittent pops of firewood.

Malik eventually reaches into her pocket, feels Adam's folded up contract in her hands. Dried blood on it. Kept close regardless. She inhales slow, steeling herself, wondering why she's doing this. She's supposed to be furious, hell, he threw her into a _tree_ , not wanting him back. Not waiting, hesitating, long enough to find out, to change her mind.

She pulls out the paper before she can pretend he hasn't heard it, seen her movement. A thick swallow as she offers it to the empty space between them.

"Do you…want this back?" so many questions tangled in one utterance, pulled from her in the quiet. _Do you want to stay_? _Why did you come back? What are you here for?_

He looks at it like he doesn't know what it is. No…wait, that's surprise. He's surprised she kept it. That she had it on her.

"You knew I'd be here?" he asks, instead of answering.

"No." She's honest, even if it means admitting that she's had this one thing on her for the past year.

"No." he repeats, as if he didn't hear her. As if he couldn't have heard correctly.

She says nothing, just shifting her hand, the paper in it catching the flickering firelight.

He reaches for it, just like she reached for his hand. Before his fingers close on it, she pulls it back a little, suddenly. "No more getting yourself almost killed?"

"No more," he concedes.

"Condition number one is you keep yourself alive." She almost sounds threatening.

"That's not exactly how bodyguarding works," he protests, but he's humoring her, she thinks.

"I wasn't anywhere near you that time."

"Alright, alright. I accept."

She offers it back to him, then.

He takes it, and she can't stop the small smile that blooms on her face. The matching one on his doesn't escape her notice.

They sit in the quiet, the fire crackling the only noise, and Malik drifts without meaning to. It's warm, and she's. Safe. For the first time in a year, she doesn't have to start at every noise, and she'd have been warier about falling into this comfort so easily but the raid coupled with the fall, on top of running for her life and then running into _him_ has left her bone-tired.

The wind changes direction, shifts so it's coming at them instead of from behind, and the sudden cold seeping through his coat and it wakes Malik with a start. Instead of finding her chin pillowed on her arms, her head is on…Adam's shoulder, isn't it.

His shades are on, but she sees the softness in his expression, the lack of tension in his forehead, for just an instant before he notices she's awake. Huh.

She looks sheepish, pulling her head off him in a start and scooting away suddenly. "Shit- sorry," she hadn't meant to fall asleep.

"It's fine," he reassures her, and she scrubs at her face. If she was any groggier she might scoop a handful or two of snow just to rub in her face and wake up. The warmth she'd clawed together is hard-won though, and she'll be damned if she gives it up so easily.

The cheek that had been on Adam's shoulder is also, strangely, warm. She pretends she didn't notice that.

"What time 's it?" rubbing at her forehead, trying to see if her infolink will start up _now_. It doesn't, but her HUD lights up, at least. A little glitchy, and not quite able to pinpoint their location, but it's a baby step in the right direction.

"4:03," he answers, looking at her with a frown. "Infolink still down?"

"Think so. I'm gonna need another biocell to get it to behave." She's subconsciously reaching into her pocket for the dose of neuropozyne she'd missed last night in the mad rush, and. Stops. Her lips thinning into a frown, as she pulls out the shattered vial from her flightsuit and holds it up at the assassin, waving the broken and empty top back and forth in the low light of the dying fire. "You wouldn't mind sparing me some nupoz, since you broke mine into a tree and all?" It's half teasing, since she's sure he has plenty on hand for all of his extensive augmentation.

Adam Jensen actually flinches. "Uh. No." He brings a hand up to the back of his neck. "I don't have any on me."

"You don't." She's in utter disbelief. Is he trying to tell her he doesn't have enough to share? "You're telling me the most infamous assassin, who prepared a team with snowshoes and goggles and _EMP fields_ didn't bring himself neuropozyne, when he has at least three more augs than I do." At least.

"Don't need it." His answer is gruff, half a snap, and she wonders where _that_ came from. Is he bitter about it, angry at her, or angry at himself for breaking hers? Perhaps a mixture of all three.

A few pieces click into place that she's not sure she wanted to see.

"That's why Sarif augged you to the teeth." It's quiet in the still-frozen dark, a little horrified, and if he ignores the words it'll be like she never spoke them.

He doesn't answer her in words, but huffs, just a single nod accompanying it.

" _Asshole_." She bites the word out into the frost. He nods, and she moves to stand. "Guess that means I have an even more pressing reason to get to town." She wasn't anywhere near her territory, though, and she knew smaller cities had less resources for augs anyway.

Not to mention, she didn't have a prescription. She _was_ dead, after all. And if he didn't need it, then he didn't have one either.

She'll worry about it later. There was some time before rejection set in, anyway. She kicks snow over the small fire, making sure its out and hidden, before pulling Adam's coat off her shoulders and offering it to him. "Thanks," she says. For this. For coming back. For so many unspoken things.

He tries to refuse the coat.

"I _am_ going to just leave it here if you don't take it." The sun will be up soon, she's warm enough, and they're going to get walking anyway. She waits a second longer before letting go of it, watching it start to fall toward the snow and the charred coal remnants of their fire.

He snatches it out of the air before it can, looking annoyed. She grins back at him, turning around and walking off, northeast. That was the nearest large town, Hajnówka, if she was reading her HUD right and it wasn't lying to her. Adam will stop her if she is, she hopes. Maybe he wouldn't, though, just for the hell of it. She actually wouldn't put it past him.

They walk until it's light, and it's only as they near a road that Malik has second thoughts. "You think they'd spread out this far looking?" It wasn't police, they wouldn't have used Adam, but that didn't mean that they didn't have the funding to go bigger when they'd found out she escaped. "Won't they be after you too?"

"Not if I check in."

She wonders how he intends to juggle this. He's risking his integrity and reputation by going back on an agreement, by lying to a client and then killing their men.

"I'd tell you to try and look a little less suspicious, but I don't think you physically can." Not to mention, she still had that firebird emblazoned over her shoulders. The both of them would stick out like sore thumbs. Maybe a winter jacket was the first thing in order for her. She had to have a credit chip on her somewhere.

He snorts at her, lifts a hand like he's going to start drafting an email. Mindlessly checking his pockets with his other hand, and quietly handing her a biocell when he finds one. She wonders why he didn't mention having one earlier, but she'd felt how heavy his coat was when it had been around her shoulders – maybe he had so much in it that he didn't honestly know he had one.

She presses it to her forehead, right up against her chip, and squeezes the trigger, feeling the sweet jolt of energy flood into alloy. And _oh_ , her HUD stops glitching against her eyes and she feels her infolink come alive again. Maybe her leg had sapped too much energy being a constant heater and none could be routed to her neural augs. Whatever the problem, it seemed to be fixed.

She's immediately calling Vaclav.

"Kid?" as soon as he picks up.

"Mal, thank _fuck_ you're alright-" a loud exhale of relief on his end, and she can't help but smile.

"Sorry for going dark on you so long. I-link wouldn't start up till I found a second biocell." They're standing near the edge of the forest, haven't moved out from cover and well hidden from the road and any passersby. "How's everything over there?"

"No no, you do _not_ get to do that to me, _Phoenix_ , you don't get to have _Icarus call me for you_ and then act like nothing big has happened. What is going _on_ over there?" he's wound himself up, and she thinks newsfeeds have been to blame, on top of her radio silence.

"He uh…took a hit on me so that they wouldn't put a bomb on my plane and offered to work for me again?" she doesn't mention that she asked him to, that she offered it first. The wording catches Adam's attention, his eyebrow lifting at her as he sends his message.

"You re-hired the assassin that you fired to be your bodyguard because he, _let me make sure I get this clear_ , accepted a probably _large_ amount of money to _kill_ you and hasn't yet?" Vaclav would be holding her by the shoulders and shaking if she were there with him, she thinks.

"Yeah, more or less."

" _Mal_."

"I don't think he's here to kill me, V. Anyway, I have something a little more important to deal with-"

" _What could possibly-_ "

"Can you point me to the nearest place I can get nupoz?" Quiet. He knows many people in Europe, knows who she might be able to turn to outside of her territory. He'd dealt with a lot of people in the underground, even while working for the Dvali.

"Oh _fuck_ , you don't have any?"

"It uh. Broke."

"When were you supposed to take it?"

"Last night. Should be okay for a little longer." If she started pushing it, her leg would shut down. Her neural chip would start to really fuck around with her.

"Where are you?"

"Hajnówka," she answers. "Poland. Right on the outskirts of that giant fuck-all forest." They'd wanted her to crash into it. Make it harder for police to get to the wreckage before they could.

"I don't know anyone there. Closest contact I have is in Brest. Can you get there? I'll send you his contact info and tell him to expect a call." Not naming her, of course. He knows better.

"Thanks, V. I owe you dinner when I get back."

"I'm just. Glad to hear you're okay." A heavy sigh, and the guilt twists sharp in her chest at worrying him. "I'll tell our hacker friend."

"Talk to you soon."

Adam is waiting patiently, keeping an eye on their surroundings. Glancing at her as she finishes her call, and then at the town just beyond them.

"He doesn't know anyone here. Brest is our best bet."

"Our _brest_ bet?" he offers. She snorts before she can force herself to groan, shoulders shaking in the quiet morning.

"You stop that." She's digging in her pockets, pulling out all her credit chips. Not enough for an hour and a half taxi south. "Guess we're stealing a car." Funny, that she tried to do _something_ legally, when she'd been robbed of the one thing that made her feel free.

They walk into town, a quiet side-road, and it's still early enough – and cold enough, below freezing – that people haven't quite woken up yet.

"Take your pick," he offers, holding his right hand up, a ring on his thumb joint lighting up.

"You can hack cars." What _can't_ he do?

"Their alarms, at least."

"Well, good thing I know how to hotwire 'em."

"Should I ask why?"

"College," she answers, pointing out a beaten up, dark blue car at the end of the street, near enough to a tree that they can stay more or less hidden.

He twists his wrist, the light shifting green, before dropping his hand. "All yours." Malik has no doubt he could hotwire a car too, and as she's forcing the locks open and digging in under the steering column, she idly wonders how he got from job to job before working for a pilot. Maybe she'll ask later. The engine turns over, the car starting up with a sputter, and she grins victoriously. One of her faster jobs, she thinks to herself, sliding into the seat and unlocking the passenger side for Adam to climb into. He does, and they take off south.

Malik _does_ ask while they drive, the sun rising and dyeing the snow-covered ground pink and gold, the world around them waking up.

"Can _you_ hotwire a car?" She wishes she had a cup of coffee. Some warm breakfast. She'll get some when they get to Brest.

He huffs in amusement. "Yes."

"Where'd you learn to?"

"My old job." He seems like he's fighting a smirk, and Malik forces herself to remember that she's still _mad at him_ , he's not off the hook yet.

"What, were you a car thief?"

"Cop."

She chokes, almost swerves off the freeway. He's almost full-on _grinning_ at her, and she thinks- he _has_ to be fucking with her.

"You're joking."

He doesn't deign her with an answer.

"The world's most expensive assassin was a _cop_?" She's so tempted to look over at him again instead of the mostly empty road, but she has no idea when it'll turn a tight corner, and she just spares him the quickest of glances. He seems to be enjoying himself.

"You're telling me Sarif screwed you over so hard you totally gave up on law?" It's not the most unbelievable thing – if Sarif abused legal contracts to do what he'd done to her, she'd give up entirely on law and order too.

"Something like that." He doesn't elaborate, and she thinks this might be a touchy subject. Drops it for now.

They get to Brest, dump the car near a scrap yard, and go out in search of breakfast. Or at least, Malik does. Adam pulls out some kind of bar from his coat, offers it to her, and shrugs when she refuses, biting down on it. She wants _coffee_ , something warm, needs the caffeine before she even starts to engage with the underground again.

One that probably thought she was dead. Again.

Maybe they would finally start to learn that she wasn't so easy to kill.

There's a small coffeeshop nestled in a quiet corner of a street that looked like it got busy in the afternoons, open so early and she smells the coffee brewing from down the street. Follows her nose and is immediately stepping through the door once she finds the shop. Ordering herself the largest latte she can get, with as many shots of espresso as they'll let her, picking out a pastry from the shelf.

"What do you want?" she asks him when he walks in behind her.

He surprises her by ordering something sweet, caramel-laden coffee and a sugary pastry. She doesn't question it, handing a credit chip over and smiling warm at the girl behind the counter. Tipping her extra for her patience with Malik's rusty Russian – she'd picked it up the same way she'd gotten all her other languages, most of them in flight school so she knew no one was talking shit about her, but it had been a while since she'd had to use it.

Malik reaches out to Vaclav's contact while they eat, tearing into her pastry – something cheesy and with ham – and ignoring the way Adam seems to be watching her. Paying less attention to their surroundings, and she idly wonders why that is.

She forgets her curiosity when the mechanic tells her she can't come by until the evening. Annoyed. No one made the Phoenix wait – but that was just it. She hadn't announced her identity, knew it was better to stay hidden than reveal herself to a mechanic she didn't know or trust.

"Well, guess we have a day to kill. He's not far across the city, and says he doesn't get to his shop until night anyway." She supposes that was when most mechanics did business, anyway. Not just Vaclav and his awful sleep schedule. Augs still had to work, after all, and procedures tended to be lengthy. "  
 _Brest_ day ever," she intones into her coffee.

Adam snorts, this time. She smiles crooked, sitting up and rolling out her shoulders.

"Guess that gives me time to look into finding a new plane." It had been a while since she'd had to shop for one, and she already missed hers immensely. She didn't want a new one.

Didn't change the fact that hers was blown up in an ancient forest. She'd have to get the next one painted even more extravagantly in tribute.

They spend most of the day in a quiet corner of the café, eating sandwiches for lunch, and Adam slumps against the wall while she starts researching how many planes of her model were available and around. He seems to get some rest, finally, and she does her best not to move, to do nothing that would startle him, while he does. She doesn't know if he's even asleep, if he could be in such a public space, but she hopes for his sake that he is.

Malik only moves to get up when the sun starts to set, ordering a last coffee to go – another sweet one for Adam, just in case it hadn't been a one-off craving – and setting it down in front of him, a quiet murmur of his last name. He doesn't jerk or startle, so she thinks he must have been awake longer than just then.

"Let's go." He nods, takes the coffee from her, and his rigid stoicism softens when he takes a sip of the sweet drink.

"Who knew you had a sweet-tooth?" she asks lightly, teasing as they leave the shop with a wave to the baristas.

"If you tell anyone, I have to kill you," he responds, voice a flat tone.

She snorts. "Your secret is safe with me, Mr. Jensen."

Their stroll takes them past an over-busy LIMB clinic, and Malik idly wonders if she'd missed something. Some news of this city having shortages? She'd been so busy, shoulders-deep in that Sarif raid and making sure it all went well that she hadn't kept an ear out for any other cities she might need to reach out to. Maybe she'd do that when she met this mechanic contact of Vaclav's.

They reach the mechanic's shop just as the street lights ignite, washing the empty road in orange light as the last of the sun's rays leech from the sky, leaving the stars to their dark blanket.

Malik reaches for the door handle, and something a street over explodes.

Adam pulls her behind him, and she's searching for the cause of the sound, for what's happening-

He groans something guttural and pained, and she thinks he's hurt-

"Adam?" stepping aside and around to get a better look, because that explosion had sounded far away and-

His nanoblade snaps out, the servos in his arm whining fierce and sharp, almost like he's fighting it. Chest heaving for air, and he whirls to face her at the movement.

"Fari-" it's cut off by another snarl, a hand reaching to press into his forehead.

Before she can fully comprehend, he's pointing the nanoblade at her, and she just barely drops out of the way as he launches it. _At her_.

Adam Jensen is trying to kill her.


	15. Overload

Everything goes to hell, very fast.

There's another explosion, closer, and Adam's shades are down but he seems to be staring through her. She's charging up her speed boost, and the door to the mechanic's shop bursts open. She scrambles out of the way of a large man with equally large alloy arms, and he doesn't notice her, eyes on Icarus.

There's some kind of growl in the man's throat as he charges for the assassin, and Jensen changes targets. Another nanoblade appears and it shears right through the man's arm, half of it landing in a sparking mess at her feet.

Malik gets to her feet, ready to run, thinking Adam is still after her-

There's a gurgle behind her, a thud, and she realizes the man who'd rushed out is dead. Adam has already refocused, not a glance to spare for the body and oh. He's definitely not in control, not with the way his augs too-loudly wind up an Icarus dash.

Less thinking, more moving. She boosts off her aug, giving herself a little extra momentum and – if she gets a car between her and Icarus – he's not Adam, not like this – then he won't be able to reach her on a dash alone.

Step one, make some space, step two, find out what the hell is going on.

She vaults over a car, thinks she should make a break back for the main street, but if she throws other bodies between her and the assassin he willshred them. She's not quite willing to throw dozens of innocent lives at his feet for her own sake.

It's a good thing she clears the car and makes for the middle of the street, because the next instant, a shower of sparks falls from his legs, glittering gold and he slams into the car with one foot out. It goes flying, and she thinks 'holy fuck' in some mixture of fear and awe.

It explodes when it lands behind her, and the impact brings another scream to her ears. The street isn't empty, and she sees people running from augs, from the main street here to this side escape.

Augs.

Malik hopes the crowd moving between her and the assassin is enough to give her a moment – hopes that somehow he keeps her as the target in mind and doesn't rampage off. She's not sure she could stop him if he did – hell, she's not sure she can stop him now either.

The moment of calm buys her enough time to call Vaclav, as she takes off again, heading further into the city.

He picks up, thank fuck.

"Vaclav," she bites out, glancing back to make sure Adam is still on her. The aug at the back of the last pack seems to have focused on him- shit.

"Yes?" he sounds confused, worried.

"You're okay?" she pauses, jumps onto a car and whistles sharp. Hopes she catches Jensen's attention. "Hey! Was it the sugar thing?"

There's another groan, something angry, and yep, that worked. He throws aside the aug – she watches their body crumple into a trashcan – and charges for her again.

"Mal? What's going on?" His voice pitches high.

"Thank god you're okay. Something's happening – Icarus is trying to kill me and augs are losing their minds-" The assassin can only dash in straight lines, so she boosts at the last moment to dodge aside of him. She'd lash out back but she doesn't want to be anywhere near arms' reach of him, knows he can rip her apart the moment he gets a hand on her.

"Icarus is-"

"Not of his own volition!" She hears a nanoblade pop out and pulls out a gun. Being nonthreatening isn't going to do shit for her if he's not in control, and she wonders if his augmentations have any weak points she can try and hit.

"He's lost control?" There's a clattering, and a quiet "oh god" as she hears several newsfeeds light up on his side.

"Barricade yourself in there, don't let anyone in, and get Pritchard-" she hears the sizzle of the nanoblade superheating, barely manages to duck to the right and out of the way as it slices for her head.

"Malik-" Pritchard's voice cuts in suddenly, and she wants to sob in relief. Both of her closest friends hadn't been taken over by…whatever this was.

"Please tell me you know what's going on," she begs, firing a shot at one of Adam's shoulders, hoping to hit a gap in the plates. It glances off, and he doesn't even notice, reaching for a gun from one of his shoulder holsters. His augs scream loud, grating, far louder than they should be, than they ever have been. She can't let him get that gun out- backs up further and shoots at it, anything to distract him. Doesn't keep a tally of how many bullets she has. Doesn't matter.

"No- are you out there?"

"Yes," she bites out. "Icarus is- shit-" he's given up on the gun for a second and tries for the nanoblade again, slicing easily through her flightsuit and grazing her side.

"Jensen's gone crazy?" she doesn't even notice the furious keysmashing as he works, hopefully at finding the source of this.

"I don't know what-" the glass windows of the bar she'd stumbled near shatter, a mob shoving to get out, to tear or escape and she dashes into it, through it. There's no makeshift weapon she can pick up to block those nanoblades, the only thing that could remotely stand up to it would be her leg, but she'd seen how that man's arm came off like he was slicing warm butter.

"Working on it. Vaclav, give me a hand." Vaclav just makes a wordless sound, and she thinks she just has to survive this- outlast him. She can't kill him and she can't beat him, but she can't just- hide behind others either.

"He's fighting it, I think- fuck, I think he's in there." How else could she explain his masterpiece augs suddenly malfunctioning so drastically? Those whines at each movement, the incremental slowdowns before firing, like he's trying to warn her of each attempt on her life he makes.

There's a snarl through the crowd, a body goes flying. Two gunshots ring out, the screams grow louder, and she glances into the bar, sees it go out to the other street. Malik hops through the broken window, ready to dash again. She just needs to get his attention-

"Icarus! I thought you were the best assassin, aren't you supposed to be hunting me?" Another body goes flying and- ah, there's his dark coat. She vaults over the bar, ducks as the nanoblade fires out – how many does he have? She hopes he runs out soon – and makes for the other exit. Any hell she walks into can't be worse than the one chasing her, this she knows with certainty.

"Faridah Malik, are you goading him?!" that's Pritchard, sharp in her ear as she ducks under a whizzing bullet – fuck, did he pull out a gun? – and makes for the other door.

"I can't just let him loose against all these innocents – they won't stand a chance."

"And you do?!"

"More than them- just, get him back to me-" Something's wrong, she knows he's not in control she can tell in the guttural groan that tears itself from his throat as he dashes through the bar's front door, splintering what was left of it off the hinges.

"Pritchard there's something-" Vaclav interrupts before the hacker can yell at her again, and Malik is throwing herself out the other side of the bar and into Brest's main streets.

There's cars on fire, screaming in the distance, people rushing away from others, and while not all those out of their minds look like they're augs- she has a fairly sinking feeling the only ones affected are all augs.

So why was she spared this?

She hears the pop and slide of another nanoblade, but instead of trying to dodge, she whirls, lifts her gun, exhales, and- there. The moment it launches she fires, and is rewarded with a shower of sparks and a grinding screech as her bullet lodges into the open space in his arm and he's down one nanoblade.

Which meant she hadn't had time to get out of its way, as it slices through and embeds neatly in her leg, metal grating as her HUD screeches a 'Foreign Object Lodged' warning at her. It still works, mostly, complaining as she pushes off on it and into the street.

"There's a broadcast-" Vaclav points out, and for once she's glad they're too busy to be keeping an eye on all her warnings. She needs them focusing everything they have on giving her back Adam.

"Vaclav, ping his infolink," Pritchard almost speaks too fast to hear, but Malik knows Vaclav operates at the same speed, and she tunes them out. She can't afford to be distracted.

A scream on her left, a window shattering on her right, an explosion behind, and she's glancing back and forth, looking for something to use.

She hears the Icarus dash charging up too late, and the impact drives the breath from her chest and sends her flying. She hits the asphalt, rolling, feels the grate of loose gravel against the back of her head. Her gun clatters away, out of reach. Stunned, her diaphragm refusing to function despite her knowing she needed to get up-

Malik tries to roll over and drag herself to her feet-

There's a weight on her aug stopping her- too late- Icarus looms over her, his boot grinding hard on her knee. The flickering firelight, the reflections of the chaos around them in his shades, the fury wound tight in his skin. The stars above frame him, glittering cold.

He points a gun at her head.

Everything slows down, and she thinks, Ah. This is it.

She closes her eyes. Braces herself.

The instant her instincts register the whine of his augs she surges, kicks all the power she has into her boost and shoves at his leg. Knocks him off balance and the gunshot cracks-

The road explodes by her head, a blinding wave of agony as she feels something shatter, her momentum carrying her over, catching herself on her knees, the nanoblade grinding into the street. A heavy thud and something slams hard into Icarus.

"Augh-" something drops with a wet noise onto the asphalt as she moves. "Fuck, bitch, motherfucker," trying to haul herself up. She thinks her leg is dead, no power left to run it.

"Faridah!"

"Pritchard, I need him back-"

He doesn't even answer her. "Vaclav, you get in and you hold that channel open-"

She doesn't hear the next thing he says, because there's another wet gurgle behind her and before she can turn, move her gun, stand up, there's a hand on the back of her throat.

Icarus flings her into a wall like he's throwing a baseball, and she hears ribs crack loud in her ears as she slams. He dashes, he's there before she slides to the ground, and his hand catches her just under her jaw.

Pinned above the ground, her leg's dead, and he-

Squeezes

"Pr-itch-"

He's holding her with the sparking, broken arm, and she hears more than sees the nanoblade slide out from his other arm. Her hands claw at his alloy arm, trying to lodge between his fingers and her throat, weaponless, her last knife stuck in her leg. Holding that nanoblade back, poised to strike, and the servos in his arm are screaming-

He lunges forward-

The blade sinks half a foot into brick just inches from her head, his shades flick off, and the hand around her throat releases all in the same heartbeat.

She drops to the ground and crumples to her knees, her aug leg falling to the side, choking inhales and a hand around her throat. He stumbles away as if burned.

"…Adam?" she grates, her voice as shredded as the night, barely managing to look up at him. Everything's hazy, too sharp and too out-of-focus in one.

"Oh god." The quiet words fall from his lips and she barely catches them. His dash lights up and she thinks he's about to go-

A passing aug makes a lunge for her and his hand is on the man's throat. This time he crushes it in an instant.

She's afraid for a moment- thinks he's been swept under again, but there's- she can see his eyes.

He reaches for her, and she nearly flinches back away from him- nowhere to go, with the wall at her back and-

"Faridah-" the name slices through her chest harder than her ribs ache, and all she can do is sag in relief.

Thank fuck. "Adam-" she reaches back, and he looks horrified for a moment – she sees it in the way the lenses of his eyes widen in just the slightest.

He lifts, helps her to her feet, and she leans heavy on him, her dead leg dangling between them.

"Pritch, you did it," she finally manages, and hears a groan of relief from both her hackers.

"We can't manually override every aug who's gone crazy-" Vaclav interjects, frantic again.

"No. Can you get into the broadcast servers?"

"No, it needs a physical override-" They work in a rush, fixed one problem and moving onto the next.

Malik feels heavy. It doesn't hurt overmuch – not yet, but she knows the adrenaline has to go some time or other.

Adam makes some choked noise in the back of his throat, some remnant agony, and bends to pick her up. Gently- so gently and she lets out some pained sigh of relief as the weight's taken off her legs, curling into him.

"You're back." A soft murmur into his chest armor, half dazed.

"I almost- I almost killed you-" like he can't believe she's in his arms but it's not as if she has much choice and even if she did she'd still put herself here.

"But ya' didn't."

"Your eye-" it's choked, and she looks up at him. He makes another pained noise as she does.

"What-?" she reaches a hand up and-

Oh. Feels the wet, the empty space, the pulverized skin. Thinks back. The thing that had fallen must have been-

She puts that thought to a screeching halt, immediately. "Only need one to see," she answers. Studiously ignores the blood she can see on her hand as she pulls it away, because if she recognizes the blood it's going to start hurting and she could really do without that-

His arms curl just slightly tighter around her. Like he can't believe her.

She's…mostly lucid. Probably.

Also in shock. Probably.

"We've gotta- get out of here," she says, because maybe stating the obvious will get him to stop standing in the middle of a street full of chaos.

He says nothing, sweeps into the nearest dark alley and heads for the edges of the city. Every once in a while, he shifts his grip on her, pulls a gun and fires. Never for long before he has both arms on her, and she starts to drift, closing her eyes-….eye.

"Malik, stay with me," a low murmur near her ear, a desperate sound clawed from his throat.

She makes some kind of noise, thinks she's telling him she's tired, and he's back- she's safe, it's fine.

"Faridah-"

She doesn't hear anything else.

Vaclav is digging, triangulating the exact location of that broadcast – is it really in the middle of the ocean?- and he's so focused that he almost misses Icarus calling, patching in.

No- he doesn't miss it. Icarus doesn't call him, he calls Pritchard. Vaclav doesn't understand, hands stilling for the smallest of moments before he picks up the work again. All his expertise with augs had given him a good in for hacking, and with a skull plate like his he'd have been a fool to never give it a try. Especially when dealing with the underground every day. Never hurt to have some kind of protection – dirt, hidden connections, whatever – against the person breathing down his neck.

He gets the location, double-checks and triple-checks, sending it over to Pritchard as he hears the assassin speak over the line.

"I've got her. She's unconscious." His voice is cold, hard, and Vaclav chews on his cheek at the sound. He hadn't looked for footage, for intellicams, he'd been hellbent on unscrambling that frequency, forcing it to switch to what Vaclav's chips ran on, forcing shutdowns on all the warnings of visual glitches that would come from the wrong frequency. Better a headache than a murdering rampage.

He hadn't even had a chance to look at her readings, make sure she was okay.

"She going to be okay?" Pritchard asks, multitasking to hell and back and Vaclav can see him trying to claw holes in the servers an ocean away.

"She's going to need an eye."

Vaclav makes a noise without even realizing it, some choked thing.

"Koller?" Icarus sounds surprised, like he didn't expect him to be on the line. "Where are you?"

"Prague- the- Mal's safehouse," he's still sorting through that information, shoving it down and away. He could be horrified later. They had to try and stop this first.

"I'll call when we're close." He disconnects, sudden and abrupt.

Vaclav needs to be brought back to focus with a snap of his name, and a frustrated growl from Pritchard.

"All the other connections there don't reach the broadcast. That thing has some kind of manual override. Fuck, who would do this?"

"If we can't stop it without being there-" Vaclav swallows thick. Looking at all the screens, the chaos and carnage, the screams. Blood and burning and bones snapping the world over. "We could always try and set off an explosion?" Wonders if there's anyone there. How many. How many would there need to be to offset the horrors happening now?

"I'll see if there's anything I can get at from here." A pause. "Or we could send the coordinates to some world leaders. I'm sure we could convince one or two to send a missile on over. Maybe the President."

Vaclav hums. "Would they? Might call us terrorists and come after us instead." Even still, the cost might be worth it. Anything to stop this-

"I'll work on getting them the location- they'll never be able to track me. I've got some powerful friends and I'll call them if I have to. See if you can get in that ocean and find a power source."

"Yeah- yeah, okay Pritchard." He sees another name pop in the corner of his HUD – ShadowChild - watches it try and prod at the same systems he's in, and then immediately shift course. "Will they even believe us?" he's asking, tracing through, trying to find some security system he could overload and cause a power surge- anything.

"Who knows? That's why I brought help. If they don't want to fire, and you can't get in, we'll do it ourselves."

"We'll what-"

"Relax kid, they're not nuclear missiles. Can't be that hard to send one off." Pritchard sounds so…unfazed. Vaclav envies him.

Doubles down on the work.

Malik wakes to the feeling of soft pressure on her face, something going around and around, soothing. Hazy, half here and half…somewhere, and she tries not to move, not to let whatever is doing that know she's awake, afraid it might stop.

She must make some kind of noise, because the movement stills, there's a hand on her jaw-

"Malik?" the word is soft, pitched low.

She opens her eyes- ow. Eye. Bites down on the groan as she looks up.

"Adam." There's an aching relief in her chest, that he's here. Some part of her thought that if she was waking up then he was dead or gone. She realizes the hand on her is his, that he'd been cradling her head and- must have been wrapping something around her eye.

"I've got a ride coming," he starts, and she's moving to sit up despite the ache in her chest and the fire in her side. She wonders if the tightness around her lungs is her ribs or. Something else.

They're in the woods outside of the city, an orange fog rolled in, blanketing the trees and curling over them, blocking the stars and muffling the screams.

Malik sits up, feels his hands start to drift off of her cautiously, and all she can think is you're here and she kisses him.

It's the shock, probably.

He's rigid, frozen against her but warm. His hands twitch, hovering and not touching and she can't quite categorize the look in his eyes but she thinks it might be afraid.

"You saved me," she says when she pulls away, smiling soft.

He chokes some noise of incredulity. "I nearly killed you and you almost let me-"

"You fought it." It's a soft sentence, made softer by the fog. She remembers, though. The sounds of his augs screaming ragged and furious. They'd never sounded like that, not in the whole time she'd known him. Whenever he'd killed for her it had been liquid, silent and as smooth as glass. This had been different. Dragged bloody and torn from him and he'd done his best to refuse. "I've never heard your augs sound like that."

He opens his mouth to say something, and she just reaches up, aching and slow but resting a thumb on his cheek. She'll blame the bloodloss later for letting her get so close, the bloodloss and the dance and how he'd made her question everything about who he was-

"If you hadn't fought it with everything in you, I'd be dead on the pavement, would have been the moment it caught you." How does she tell him that she's only alive because he gave her instants, single moments of warning that she could use? She'd known she couldn't fight him off at full strength, certainly not with just her pistol, and he'd known that too. He'd clawed at whatever it was that was tormenting him and refused to give it her. "No one else did that." No one else could. She'd seen the others- tearing gleeful and impervious to any screams.

"You taunted me," he's looking at her like she's insane, and, well, maybe she is.

"I couldn't very well just let my one-man-army loose on a terrified crowd. You would've ended up with hundreds of bodies at your feet." My one-man-army. She'd taken him back for a single day and she was already thinking of him as hers.

She wonders if he thinks it would've been worth it to spare her. She doesn't. Had tried to not let him hurt anyone but her, and she's still breathing. A smaller body count than she's sure many others could claim.

"Is it over?" she asks, dropping her forehead against his alloy shoulder, the arm she hadn't ruined and left stuck open.

"No." His hands still hover, and she exhales slow, leaning heavy against him.

"If you were planning on killing me, you can just do it," she mumbles against alloy, wonders where his coat went if she's on his arm- oh. It's wrapped around her. When did that happen?

"Malik-" it's a strangled sound, and if she didn't know better she'd say he was horrified.

"What? You're not gonna go under again, they pulled you out. The only way you'll kill me know is if you actually want to."

She'd seen his eyes. The wide-eyed look of disgust and horror and yet. She still feels safe with him. Despite everything. Because of it. He was the only one who fought that rage, that screaming jagged thing that demanded he kill. It sang for blood and he said no. For her.

"No wonder you picked Phoenix," he finally says, his hands alighting to rest lightly on her shoulders. The touch is grounding, keeps her here, and she tries not to sigh. "Your recklessness will get you killed and you'll need that resurrection."

"That's why I have you, isn't it?" she smiles, doesn't even bother lifting her head to look at him.

He doesn't say what she knows he's thinking, that perhaps it's her recklessness with him that will get her killed.

She doesn't care.


	16. Transit

Icarus is stiff, his hands resting light on her, but she doesn't move and he doesn't make her. A small thing for which she is endlessly grateful. She's already taking shallow breaths, trying to minimize the deep-seated ache in her chest, and the less she moves the less she has to think about the gash in her side.

"You said you have a ride coming?" she eventually asks, when she thinks she can get a full sentence out without additional pain. It doesn't quite happen, but she's at least able to stop herself from audibly groaning.

"Yes. Should be here soon." The quiet answer, and Malik understands now why they're in a clearing. It might just be large enough for something small to land in.

"You trust 'em?" she hasn't lifted her head from his shoulder. She knows the moment she moves, his hands will be off her like lightning.

"He's sixth on my list."

That catches her interest. "Sixth?" He has a list?

"First isn't answering, second is dead, third and fourth are separated from their vehicles and can't get through, and fifth was already flying and refuses to land anywhere."

"So, number six picked up. How much does a-" a pause to internally wince "job like that cost? Personal flight in the middle of the apocalypse?"

"Couple hundred."

"Only?" that seems. Low.

"Thousand."

 _Oh_.

"You could buy a whole plane for that much-" she's startled enough that she doesn't focus on short breaths, gritting her teeth as her whole chest complains.

"What good would a plane do me? I need a ride."

She doesn't understand, can't comprehend spending so much on a single service. Wonders how she's even going to get the money to pay him back while supporting her network.

If there even is a network left to support.

Huh. That hadn't quite hit her until just then. They're either going to need her more than ever before, or…she won't have any mechanics left to support. She wonders if the man who'd charged out of the mechanic's shop had been Vaclav's contact.

She's about to further protest the obscene price of a _domestic_ flight – there won't even be any oceans involved – but he tenses, his hands a little heavier on her shoulders. She doesn't say anything, unsure of what he's reacting to.

Adam moves to gently lift her off of him and lean her back against the tree he'd been sitting against. He reaches down and pulls something out of a pocket of his coat, keeping the movement brief. A small frown and a soft rumbled apology as she flinches at the readjustment, the setting down into snow. She hopes there's a first aid kit in the plane – there better be, for what he's paying.

"Should be our ride," he says, stepping into the middle of the clearing and lifting the flashlight he'd pulled from his coat, flicking it on and off into the sky.

That's when she hears the engines, slowing down and a VTOL appears over them. Icarus gets out of the way, moving back to her, reaching down to pick her up.

"He doesn't know who you are. Better keep it that way, if possible," he murmurs into her ear as he lifts her, as she groans at the painful shift.

That explained the coat around her again, then. Hide the phoenix emblazoned on her back, keep her warm. Double purpose. He'd thought ahead.

The plane lands quickly, the side door swinging open, and Icarus carries her in. The door slides shut just as quickly behind them, the pilot already lifting off with the shortest of greetings to the assassin.

"This guy charging per hour or for the job?" Malik asks once she's set down, looking around to see if she can locate a first aid kid. She'd had to bind a cracked rib before, she could do it if she needed to.

"The job." Icarus answers.

"Perfect." She pitches her voice a bit louder so the pilot can hear. "Can we take a quick detour? I dropped something in the chaos."

"How much of a detour?" He's professional, Malik notes with appreciation. Probably hasn't noticed quite how injured she is, though Adam is looking at her in disbelief, she notes.

"Not far. Just the forest. I'll toss you the coordinates." She's doing just that when Icarus actually reaches over and lays a hand on her, stopping the action before she finishes it.

"What could possibly be-"

"That crate I had to toss. If I'm going to pay you back for this-"

"You don't need to pay me back for this." He looks, almost affronted? That's a surprise. She doesn't know quite what to do with that.

"It was mostly for you, but at the rate we're going, _I'm_ going to need most of it. And since I don't actually have a plane anymore, it's now or never."

"Mal-"

"Uh-uh," she finishes handing the pilot the coordinates of her tracker, sitting in the forest, still pinging. "You work for me now, remember? You can't not listen this time." Halfway teasing, falling back to the forest that felt like it had been months ago and not hours.

"You're insane." His other hand reaches to dig into his forehead.

"You've said. I don't even need to get up, you can get it if you're so worried," a soft smile, trying to get the creases in his brows to decrease in just the slightest.

"I'm not worried. If you die, I don't get paid." She almost thinks she's missed something through the haze of pain that's starting to set in, but she realizes then the pilot had been listening, his head tilted back in the slightest. Icarus had noticed.

"Yeah. So do me a favor and get me that first aid kit." She points up at the compartment near the ceiling, and he makes a show of not wanting to before opening the latch and setting the box down next to her.

She opens the box, evaluating what she can use – the cut in her side isn't bleeding heavily, and she thinks the nanoblade that hit her might have been the slightest bit heated for that to be the case. Half-cauterized? The ribs she needs to wrap, and that should at least get her back to Vaclav in one piece.

Malik figures she'll patch herself up after they find her crate, and it's not too long before the pilot starts decelerating, dropping lower and honing in on the target location. She hopes it landed in an open enough area that they can land on it, but luck might not be on their side.

It ends up being the latter - they're directly over a thick part of the forest, and Malik glances out the window in dismay.

"How low can you get us?" she's asking – that box alone had probably been worth at least a million, she'd _known_. Now? It would be priceless.

"I can stabilize just over the treetops," he's answering, flicking switches and changing the VTOL's flight mode.

Adam stands, going to the cockpit for a moment and looking at the camera views, as well as the pinging tracker's location. "You have a line and a crank?"

"I've got line, but the crank's not strong enough to pick up anything but a human."

Malik would suggest landing nearby and going to get it on foot, but if this was Adam's sixth choice for a pilot, she supposes he doesn't quite trust him that well.

"I'll use the line and pull it up myself, then." Adam strides back out, pushing a lever to open the side door and reaching for a line, attaching it to his combat vest. He glances at her, his expression inscrutable, before diving out.

The sound of the spool of rope spinning clangs loud, and Malik figures he used an aug to land instead of relying on the system's brakes. The line shakes for a moment, stills, and then shakes violently. She'd go look out the door, but she's fairly certain that if she stood she might actually fall over. Malik has the feeling that he wouldn't forgive her if she died from falling out of a plane she wasn't even flying.

His hands appear at the floor a moment later, and he hauls himself in, turning and pulling the rope. "Activate it," he tells the pilot. "I'll help it up."

The crank groans, trying to start up, and Jensen sets his feet wide, hauls up hard. The line spools up, and he sets a pace.

Malik can't help but watch. His arms move fluid, like organic muscles, shifting as he heaves upward, and he has to be using his strength augs, she'd _shoved_ that crate and it had taken a fair amount of leverage and all her weight to get it out of the plane. She'll blame the injuries if she gets caught looking, but his augs are beautiful.

Maybe she should steal his coat more often.

Okay, that was definitely the injuries talking.

Icarus makes a quiet sound as the crate bumps into the floor, and he has to push the line outward to get it past the lip. He's hauling the crate in with a groan, dropping it hard on the floor of the plane and immediately straightening up, not leaning against it. Signals for the door to be closed, and he exhales slow.

Glowers at her. "Happy?"

She can't quite tell if this is still an act or he's actually annoyed with her. Probably both. "Yes, thank you."

She'll check the contents when they get home – she has to deal with her ribs sooner rather than later.

"Can you give me a hand?" she asks softly as the pilot turns them back towards Prague, switching modes and flying higher. Malik keeps the coat over her shoulders, reaching to unzip her flightsuit and inhaling sharp as the movement, lifting her arms, sends a new wave of pain through her.

The adrenaline must have worn off.

"Here, let me," his voice is gruff but his hands are gentle, reaching to pull the suit off her shoulders without jostling her. Such lethal augs touching her so gently, taking such care. A far cry from the screaming hell they'd been in earlier.

His hands remain light, but his face goes stone cold when she lifts the torn tank top under her suit to show the wound in her side. She sees it, but she doesn't know what she could say to make it better.

She has to try, though. "This one barely hurts," she says, reaching for the alcoholic wipes. "This part is gonna be the shitty one."

That didn't seem to help, but she'd almost said 'it's the ribs that are really hurting' and had just barely realized that that would probably make things _worse_ instead of better.

He takes the wipes out of her hand before she can open them, and his shades are on but she can almost just see over them from the angle he's leaning down at. He just tells her a quiet, "Brace yourself," before pressing it to the wound.

She hisses sharp, her hands squeezing to fists, and he works quickly. Cleans it up and puts a wide bandage over it.

"Anything else?" his voice is quiet, low enough so it doesn't carry far.

"Should warp my ribs," she says, exhaling shallow and slow.

He reaches for a bandage, and she holds it against herself, passing him the end as he sets to binding her to keep her ribs in place. She helps him as best she can, sighing in relief once it's done, pulling her flightsuit back on.

"Please tell me there's some painkillers in there," she begs softly, pulling his coat back over her shoulders and looking in the box.

Adam beats her to it, handing her a pair of pills that she just takes dry, dropping her head back to lean against the plane wall.

"Thanks, Icarus. I'm gonna…take a nap, if that's okay with you." Exhausted, and they have at least an hour to Prague, unless the pilot flies as wildly as she does.

"Sure. I'll wake you when we're close." He puts the kit away and sits beside her, hesitating only for a moment before doing so. Maybe he'd seen how she swayed in just the slightest against the seat, breathing slow and making sure the bindings aren't too tight.

She quickly drifts off without realizing it, Icarus' warmth beside her a comforting presence.

Malik wakes again when she hears the engines shift, the slightest change in tone from horizontal burning to vertical. Her eye opening and she finds she'd been leaning on Adam again. This was…quickly becoming an unsettling habit, she thinks. How easy it was to settle against his alloy arm, how he _let_ her.

The VTOL touches down in an open area, ground level from the impact that vibrates through the floor, and Malik sits up, hissing sharp as she does. The door opens and- they're not at her safehouse. It's still dark, but it looks to be the docks they came to when they burned her leg. She doesn't say anything – knows Adam must have had a reason.

Trusts him.

The assassin moves to pick her up, and she braces herself as he gently lifts her, pulls her close to his chest. She's about to ask about the crate of augs, but he just shoves it with a foot, and it slides out of the plane and onto the street.

"Thanks Kay," he raises his voice, the rumble just barely heard over the jets. "Payment should be showing up already."

"Yep, I see it. Watch yourself out there, Icarus," the pilot calls back, waiting for them to be out of the plane before sliding the door closed and taking off after they're a safe enough distance away.

Adam carries her towards a truck, popping the bed of it and setting her down gently on the door. She leans against the side of the bed, assuming he's going to get the crate. The painkillers must be working, because everything is a dull ache and even the edges of the night feel fuzzy and faded.

He picks up the crate of augs, and, after taking a glance to the sky, noting the tiny VTOL as it disappears, turns away from her and the truck and strides quickly for a small speedboat tied up to the docks. Vaguely, she thinks that if he were anyone else, he'd be taking the augs and running. When he doesn't come back for a minute, she almost starts to think that's what's happening. She's about to rouse herself to get up when he's coming back, his boots making soft thuds against asphalt, nothing like the sounds of snow they'd been living in so recently.

She must betray the thought on her face, some small smile at his return, because he raises an eyebrow at her. "Why do you look surprised to see me?" As if he'd only walked a short distance – he had, but.

"Was thinking that if you were anyone else, you'd have left with the augs." A neat profit, one less hassle to deal with. Anyone else would have taken the temptation.

"I have a paper in my pocket that says your life is what I'm here for, not a box of augs." A pause, as he lifts her. "You sure you're all here?"

Huh. Maybe she was being a little more open than usual with him. "Good painkillers," is all she says in answer.

He huffs, she could swear he's rolling his eyes at her, as he walks back over the dock and steps carefully into the boat, around the crate and setting her into the seat next to the captain's chair.

"Thought we were taking the truck?" she pulls his coat closer over herself, sinking down into it, and very consciously not pressing her nose against the collar to see what he smelled like.

"Boat's safer. Doubt anyone out of their mind will be piloting one or taking a swim."

"Shit's still out of control?" She'd hoped the fires were just residual from the chaos. Had hoped that it would have stopped by now.

"Haven't heard any different." He crouches, rummaging around and digging into the boat's guts. She looks back at the road, makes sure it's still as quiet as it had been when they'd touched down. There's no one around, and she wonders if the chaos really is still happening. If it had concentrated into pockets of the city. She would call Vaclav but the painkillers have finally set in, and she really doesn't want her Infolink trying to pull a HUD over her missing eye, or to listen to the alerts of it warning her about needing medical attention.

Vaclav could wait.

He manages to get the boat started, and as he straightens up, Malik's eye is drawn to the motion. Watching him move, and she thinks to herself that his addiction to the coat really is a shame – he strikes quite a stunning figure without it.

She opens her mouth to tell him this, and only just barely stops the words from falling from her lips. Digging a hand into her pockets and, really, where had that come from?

Painkillers. Must be the painkillers.

Her fingers brush against some scrap, and she pulls it out to see what it is- ah. The eye she'd dug out of the aug crate, just in case she couldn't go back for it. She rolls the thing in her fingers, listening to the quiet rev of the boat engine as they peel out into the river. Maybe he's trying to stay quiet, keep any attention from being drawn to them. A good idea, if there's any police around.

She doubted it, considering the state of the world at the moment.

"You know," she says, holding the eye up to her right side, as if she were using it to see. "I picked these up for _you_."

He glances over at her, and tenses in just the slightest. Had he just suppressed a flinch?

"Lucky thing, huh? Wonder what cool shit I'll be able to do now." A world of possibility had opened up with her leg, and she'd seen the kind of things Vaclav did with clients' eyes.

"You had an eye in your pocket and you made me haul up a crate because?" he asks, piloting slow and sticking close to the banks, hiding in the shadows. She wonders if he's just trying to keep her awake.

"When, in the near future, was I going to be able to go get it otherwise?" she frowns, looking at the eye in her hand. She hopes it hadn't gotten scratched in all of her exhausting escapades. If being slammed into a tree hadn't, being thrown into asphalt might have.

"You could have asked someone."

"I'd have to trust 'em, and they'd have to still be around." A soft hum, sliding the eye back into her pocket so she can curl tighter into his warm coat. "I'm gonna assume for now that I can't get anything if I need it." Safer than relying on a network that might not even be alive any longer, might have all gone insane and tried to kill each other.

"A big enough paycheck tends to work," he says, and yeah, he's definitely being more talkative than usual.

"Not all of us are made of money, Mr. Jensen," she huffs. "I'll have you know I have exactly thirteen cents in my bank account." Her nicer mechanics paid her in a warm meal whenever she brought them parts.

"That's not something most people are proud of." She can almost see the disapproving eyebrows from where he's not looking at her.

"I'm not most people," she says, as if he didn't know this.

"I'm aware."

"should steal your coat more often," she mumbles, in what she had thought had been her head.

"What?" He's halfway turned to look at her, and really, it only reaffirms the thought. The dying light of a fire across the bank illuminates his augs, his tactical vest, his legs. His ass, too.

She may or may not be staring.

"What?" she finally asks, looking up at him.

He raises an eyebrow, and she thinks it might be in concern, now.

"You're going to start stealing my clothes?" He sounds disbelieving, but maybe that has more to do with the fact that she did her best to refuse his coat earlier, in Poland. A whole world away.

"Warm," she just says. As if that's the answer. In the clear. "'nd you've got a nice ass."

Nevermind.

The actual shock on his face is a nice look that she will cherish forever, thanks to the black box she's got in her head. Won't have much depth, what with only one eye to record from, but she hopes it manages to get a good snapshot despite most of her HUD being shut off.

He composes himself. "You're still in shock."

"Probably," she acquiesces. "Doesn't mean I'm lying."

He just heaves a long-suffering sigh, doesn't say anything further. Probably thinking that if he doesn't engage, she'll just keep to herself. Or maybe they're close. The houses are starting to look familiar, though she doesn't have much experience from the river-side or in the almost-dawn.

"You should let me-"

"There," he interrupts her, pointing at her safehouse. As if she couldn't recognize her own home.

"Yeah, I see it," a little grumpily. She'd had a good idea there - though she can't quite recall what it was. "Is that…is Vaclav sitting in the window?" she sits up a little to see better, but that looks like the dim lights catching off dark metal augs. It's definitely _someone_ , so she hopes it's Vaclav. Anything else would be a very bad sign.

"Looks like it," the assassin answers, quietly turning the boat for the wall by her home, as Vaclav moves suddenly from the seat and rushes for the door.

He's running out, looking far worse than he usually does, exhausted and tired to the bone, but. In one piece, thankfully. She couldn't say the same for herself.

"Mal-!" it's a quiet cry, as he's reaching down to help Icarus tie the boat to a post along the wall.

"Hey kid," she says, smiling warm. "I thought I told you to stay inside and not open the door for any reason," a chiding noise, frowning hard.

"You're always the exception," he answers, as Adam moves to pick her up and hand her up to the mechanic. Vaclav braces his knee against the stone, taking her gently and standing slow. She doesn't even notice the pain, _finally,_ which means the drugs must have set in.

"you're okay?" she asks, glancing over to see Adam lifting the crate out and setting it on the wall, hopping out of the boat before untying it and letting it drift off. Just another piece of damage among billions, surely.

"I'm here," he just says. She can echo the sentiment. Things wouldn't be 'okay' for a long while yet. "Let's get you inside. What did you do to my leg?!" He's either just noticed or he's trying to distract her. Whatever it is, it works.

"Took a blade for me. Better that one than my meatier one, huh?" a smirk tossed in Icarus' direction, though he doesn't seem to notice, hauling the crate behind them as Vaclav climbs the steps to the door.

He sighs, almost to the door. "I suppose." Moving to shift her so he can hold her in one arm, but Jensen sets the crate down and is opening the door before he can finish he movement.

"Your augs don't include mind-reading, do they, Jensen?" he asks, half a laugh as he steps through the door.

"Not as far as you know," he rumbles. He almost sounds amused. Maybe shaken, is more the right term for it.

"That'd be a cool aug," Malik mentions, curling just slightly to avoid being a hindrance through the doorframe.

Vaclav carries her straight to his workshop, wants to get under those bandages and see just how much damage had been done to her eye. The way Jensen is looking at it, it's either really bad, or he's the one who did it – which would…also likely make it very bad.

"I even brought my own aug, V, look," she says, digging into her pocket again and pulling out the eye.

"You know, Mal, people don't usually bring their own limb replacements when they come to me."

"Yeah, I'm just prepared like that."

Adam comes in, then – he must have gone to set the crate he'd been carrying inside and lock the doors. Probably close the shutters and turn off unnecessary lights too. He was an expert in remaining hidden.

"She's got a laceration in her side and injured ribs, too," he tells the mechanic, sounding…far too subdued for the infamous assassin. Malik picks it up easily, but she thinks even Vaclav can see something is off.

"You dealt with those?" Vaclav asks, setting her gently in his chair and taking the eye from her, setting it on a side table.

"More or less. She might need stitches for the side." He's leaning against the wall by the door, and Vaclav can tell he's likely not going to budge any time soon.

"Alright firebird, I'm gonna put you under and get you that eye in, okay?" he asks, a gentle hand on her cheek, pulling her attention.

"I was gonna sleep for a year anyway," she says, quietly glad that she still had that warm coat wrapped around her as she lay in his chair.

"Get some rest, Mal," he says, pressing a needle to her throat – when'd he pick that up? – and smoothly sinking it into skin. She falls asleep before the anesthesia has a chance to hit.

(art by the lovely pidoodle on tumblr! 3)


	17. Spiral

Adam makes sure the house is locked down, shades pulled and no unnecessary lights bleeding out into the darkness outside. The smallest distraction before he's going back to watch Vaclav, to see him and…what he'd done to her.

He gets back just in time to see her go under, see the way she slumps exhausted in his chair, as her shoulders loosen and the crease in her forehead eases.

Vaclav moves to shift the coat off of her gently, lifting her with care off the chair with one arm to pull it out from under her with the other. He offers it back to Icarus, not saying anything about the fact that she was wearing it. Hopefully he never will.

Adam thinks he knows Vaclav better than that. The mechanic will eventually say something, the kid could never keep his mouth shut when it came to anything not business- or life-threatening.

He doesn't put it back on. Hangs it over the back of a chair and leaves it for the moment. Arms crossed as he leans against the doorframe and he does his best to hide how hard he's focusing on keeping very consciously aware of every single aug of his. Unable to stop thinking of the moment he lost control, the screeching rush of fury that had slid straight into his gut his chest his augs and took from him.

Vaclav doesn't notice, or pretends not to, at least, as he works on getting the top half of her flightsuit off. She would never forgive him for cutting it apart if she wasn't dying, and even the slice in the fabric wasn't enough for her to discard it – she always patched her suits for as long as she could before it stopped looking professional enough, and only then would she buy a new one.

The mechanic slides the dark suit over her shoulders, off her arms and down, and Adam's attention is caught by the movement. Vaclav pulls her tanktop up enough to expose the bandage on her side, and Adam frowns hard, looking over her carefully. She had gained a handful of scars he didn't remember from the last time he'd seen her – back when she'd been learning to use her new leg. Slices across her sides. A bullet nestled between her ribs on the right. Gashes over her arms.

He can't help but wonder how many of those he could have prevented.

He wonders how she got them. If she tended to those injuries herself – the scars weren't small, not professionally stitched – if she had been alone when she'd gotten hurt.

He wonders why that bothers him.

He must have focused on that train of thought for longer than he'd thought, because by the time he snaps back to Vaclav's movements, he's already finished stitching up her side and is putting a new bandage over it.

Vaclav leaves the chest wrappings alone – he could redo it when she was awake, knows she'd appreciate not being touched while she's out and under. The compression they'd done on their way here was enough to keep her ribs together.

The mechanic pauses with his hands over the makeshift bandage over her eye – it's already seeping red, the fabric stained and wet to the touch. Vaclav swallows hard, his fingers curl for a moment, before reaching around and carefully, carefully unraveling it.

Adam hasn't moved. Riveted. He doesn't want to see, he already knows what it looks like what he did. But. He can't turn away.

Vaclav's hands still when he gets it off, he just barely manages to curb the sound of horror when he sees the ruin of her face – very aware that Icarus is right there. It comes out of him as a choked wheeze, and he stalls hard only for a moment.

In the next, he moves fast, reaching for clean tools, and just swallows hard. It was easier to cut into clients he didn't know. Pulls a stool and hunches over her and sets to work.

Adam doesn't notice any of this. The moment her face is uncovered his breath freezes hard in his chest. Rigid and cold at the gaping hole where her eye should be, the swollen ruin around the skin, the shattered bone he can see glistening in the work light.

The cold horror in his ribs that he did this to her.

She lies still as Vaclav cuts and though her chest rises and falls, soft and far too at ease for how much pain she should be in, artificial and induced-

It's too much like the moment he held a gun to her head and she closed her eyes. Like she was ready to die, ready for him to kill her, and she hadn't even resisted in any lethal form-

He knew she could fight, he'd seen it at the gala he'd watched from afar, in the way she carried herself, in the muscles wound tight in her shoulders. But she hadn't fought him, had tried to disable the weapons he was so rapidly turning on her without hurting him.

He'd be angry about that if he wasn't stuck on loop like a sticking gear of the way she'd looked under him, like she was done fighting. The surge and kick a moment later, his desperate attempt to aim away from her, to resist the fury static wild in his gut that told him to kill everything in his path – none of that wipes away the single instant of calm acceptance.

The look on her face now is too similar.

He lurches off the doorway, augs a whine in his ear and makes for the bathroom across the hall. Something roiling in his gut and he thinks he might be sick. Ripping off his chest plate because there's not enough air in his lungs and that must be the cause, flinging it against the wall in his hurry. His hands grip the sink hard, fingers digging digging and if he was thinking clearly he might worry about leaving imprints in the stone.

A dragging, agonized inhale. His HUD warns him of his erratic heartbeat – funny, that his metal heart could still malfunction just like its flesh counterpart – of his oxygen levels, of the 'panic' warning in the corner of his eyes.

He holds the breath.

Exhales.

Shades up and staring at himself in the mirror, the twisting lenses in his eyes-

Bad idea. The shades are back down instantly.

Adam's arms shake against the sink, his damaged arm sparking hard at the subconscious commands sent to it, and for one terrifying moment he thinks he's about to lose control again. There's an instant where he considers using his nanoblade to disable everything permanently – he won't be used again won't be out of control-

It takes another moment to register that the shaking is coming from him.

Another slow inhale, dragged through a synthetic rebreather. Hold it. Exhale.

Finally, the ache in his chest settles, his breath evens out, and he lets go of the sink, turns on the faucet. Cold, all the way to cold, and splashes it, digs under his shades at his face, scrubbing. Trying to ground himself back.

He doesn't think he'll ever be able to stop seeing the red angry ruin of her eye, the gaping hole, and her obstinate fucking trust of him anyway.

Adam is so very tempted to call Kay again, pay for a ride to Detroit, walk into David Sarif's fucking office, and shoot him. To see his expression, the single instant where he thinks that he might have Adam crawling back with his tail between his legs, willing to work. And to see that crumple beautifully when he pulls his revolver and aims it between his eyes. Or maybe he'll aim for his right eye and bury that bullet into his skull.

An eye for an eye.

If Sarif hadn't stuffed him full of augs like an over-eager child at build-a-bear, he wouldn't have been in a position to hurt her so greatly. He'd found the logs – that only his internals, left arm, and skull needed augmentation. That he had so much more is all to blame on Sarif's fucking ego. And then to have the gall to expect him to stay and continue working for him on whatever bullshit corporate espionage he was supposed to care about-

Fuck that.

When Pritchard sent him an interesting email a few months later, of Megan Reed admitting she'd taken his DNA, well.

She'd better hope she died in the attack. If she didn't, he'd finish the job if he ever saw her again.

Well, his breathing had evened out at least. Sarif and Reed would be so lucky to never come across him again.

He straightens up, looks at those reflective, inscrutable shades in the mirror. Exhales a sigh, rolls his shoulders back, and steps back.

There may be finger-shaped marks in the stone.

He steps back to the workshop, and Vaclav hasn't moved but the wound on her face has been cleaned, cut away, prepared for augmentation. Less swollen meat and more unhealed injury. The hole still gnaws at him, makes a matching wound in his chest.

"Heeyyy, Mr. Tall, Dark, and Augged," Vaclav looks pale, his voice not quite right as he tries to hit lighthearted and easy. "You might not want to be here for this. Iiii dunno how much you remember about your own augging, but the eye isss….not a fun one."

Adam remembers connecting her leg, holding her down as she reacted sharp, painfully. He wonders if the eye is worse. The uneasy look in Vaclav's eyes says it is.

Instead of leaving, of staying back, he steps forward.

"Aaaahh…Icarus?" He sounds confused, run ragged. A little lost.

"I'll hold her down," his voice is even, and he's almost proud of that fact. It took more effort now than it has before.

"You're….sure about this?" The leg had been one thing – he hadn't actually done that, but this…

He doesn't answer the mechanic. Just fixes him with an unmoving stare. Vaclav holds his hands up in surrender, wiping them off with a rag and reaching for the eye, disconnecting it from the tablet he'd had running to make sure it was still in perfect condition. And then disconnecting the eyeball from the optic cable.

"Alright. Hold her head still for me. The rest of her might react but I need her head unmoving." He lines up the cable, takes a deep breath to steady himself, and braces himself to hear her sounds of pain, again.

Adam hesitates. The moment of gut-wrenching anxiety at being close to her, that he might suddenly find his hands not under his control anymore, that they might seek to hurt her again-

Vaclav glances up at him, hands stilling. Like he's considering moving to brace her down and do the operation on his own.

Adam steps forward, braces his hands almost gently at her jaw, at the top of her head. Leaning over her heavy, using his weight to brace the rest of her even as he feels a static fear in the back of his mind. Illogical – distance from her didn't dictate how likely he was to try and kill her again, but it's there nonetheless.

His face betrays nothing, shoulders braced in preparation – they'd had to hold her down pretty strongly for the leg, and an eye was so much more delicate. He just nods at the mechanic, thumb digging in just the slightest at her jawline, and he braces himself, breathing deep.

Vaclav doesn't say anything about the tightness in his expression, or the way he's leaning over her and bracing her down hard. He just steadies himself, exhales, and slides it in, digging for the connecting PEDOT implant he'd already set.

The cable slides in and connects with an almost inaudible click. It's the last moment of quiet.

Her left eye shoots open and an agonized scream catches low in her throat as she tries to thrash, writhe, get away from whatever is hurting her. Adam doesn't move, hands steady on her, holding her down. The noise doesn't make it past her teeth, he's holding her still, and the panicked fear in her eyes is another spike in his gut.

"Ahfuck I'm sorry, I'm sorry firebird, just give me a sec-" Vaclav works faster, settling the rest of the cable into its place. Reaching for the eye without even looking back for it, turning it and sliding it into the socket. He pushes it in against the struts he'd placed down to reinforce the bones that had shattered.

A sob bubbles in her throat and Adam is focusing everything he has on keeping her unmoving while not breaking her jaw, hopes he's not holding her hard enough to bruise. Afraid that when he lifts his hands there will be more marks, more signs of what he's done-

The lenses in the eye twist suddenly, come alive, and Vaclav is just as quickly disconnecting it, twisting it back and forth in some sequence before pulling the eye out again. As soon as his hands are away he nods, setting the eye down where he'd picked it up and reaching gentle for her shoulder.

Adam lets go immediately, and she is still very much awake, and very much in pain. One of her hands fly up to try and cover the hole in her face and Vaclav has to catch it before she can do so, his thumbs stroking reassuringly at the back of her palm.

Adam's not thinking, clearly or at all, because the next thing he does is put a hand back into the back of her hair and pull her head into his chest, careful to keep the injury facing away so the just-cleaned wound couldn't get dirty.

The sound of pain that had been clawing out of her chest stops with a shuddery wheeze, and he doesn't even realize he's stroking his thumb gently through her hair, soothing and slow.

"I've got you." A quiet murmur into her hair, the rumble barely audible, but the way Vaclav's gaze snaps to him doesn't escape his notice.

She makes another sound, and Vaclav is reaching for gauze pads to put over her eye, leaning away for just a moment while Adam holds her to himself. The mechanic leans back as soon as he has them in hand, pressing close to put them over her eye and tape them down. Adam helps pull the tape around her head, tries to ignore how he can feel her shake against him.

Once it's wrapped, he just turns her head into him, arms around her, and he's not thinking about anything except trying to ease those tortured sounds that had been coming from her. One hand in her hair and the other on her spine, a slow movement up and down. He doesn't notice Vaclav watching, the look of surprise not remotely hidden, before he suddenly moves to clean up. He almost doesn't notice the easing of the tension in her shoulders, the slow slump into him.

"Fuck." It's a quiet whimper, nearly muffled into his chest.

He echoes the sentiment.

Malik wakes up suddenly and violently to the feeling of something boring into her skull.

She tries to throw off whoever's attacking her, tries to move, but there's a weight on her.

She tries to scream. The sound catches hard in her throat and there's metal holding her mouth shut, and the thing in her skull feels like it's on fire.

Someone's leaning over her, and she's trying to categorize trying to think past the literal spike in her brain and suddenly there's another pressure against the thing in her skull and something slides in and presses against injury. It really shouldn't hurt more than the thing digging into her brain but she notices it regardless.

She needs to see, needs to memorize the faces of those she's going to hunt the fuck down later and make them feel every moment of this but sharper. Her eye closes against her will as something. Else. Turns on.

There's a single instant in which she hears an activation, feels something spin and focus and-

It's just as quickly gone.

All at once the metal holding her down eases, pulls her up instead, into soft, warm fabric. Turning her very very injured side away and into open air, and just.

Holding her close.

There's. A hand in her hair. The noise she'd tried to make dies an ignoble death in her chest, as the pounding agony subsides to a dull thud. As the fear and adrenaline and instinct to fight and thrash and claw- subsides.

"I've got you."

The voice is low, rumbles against her hair and settles in her chest and even if she's not quite here enough to know just what or whose it is, it. Comforts her. Brings her down to ground.

She slumps into that warmth, feels something pressed against her eye and when the scratch of tape unwinding ceases, she finds her face turned fully into that chest. Darkness away from that piercing light and the cover over her wound means no one else was going to try and dig into her brain.

She shudders, feels a hand on her spine, a comforting weight. Recognizes, suddenly, whose hands those are.

"Fuck." Quietly, into his chest. A heavy inhale. A less stable exhale. Her right hand moves, no longer held down, to cover the fabric over her eye. She doesn't press down, doesn't incite more pain, just. Covers it. Her fingertips tremble against her forehead, and she doesn't notice.

"I'm sorry Mal-" from her right, and she doesn't turn to look. Knows that voice. Vaclav. She must be…home? As much of one as she has. "I can't give you anything else for the pain- Jensen already gave you some painkillers and I had to put you under. I'm afraid any more and it might be too much." He speaks fast, as he always does when he's nervous.

She tries to say 'it's fine.' The sound that makes it past her teeth is another groan. Not quite what she was aiming for, but she'd take what she could get.

So she's with Vaclav, and. Adam? She thinks. Somewhere safe. Which doesn't explain the pain in her eye, the stabbing agony and why she was suddenly awake. She'll think about it later. Maybe ask Adam to go hunt down whoever did it to her and make them hurt.

For now, it's warm. There's a comforting touch in her hair, over her spine and shoulders, and she just.

Breathes.


	18. Reanimation

The next time Malik wakes up, she's in a bed she vaguely recognizes. She doesn't remember passing out. She must have, to be waking up.

Her head throbs, and she instinctively reaches a hand to put pressure on the ache over her eye-

Hits some gauzy covering and pauses. Lifts her other hand to scrub at the other side.

It's dark, but she's not sure if that's because it's night or because the shades are pulled tight across the window. She reaches for the blanket over her, pulling it off and sliding to the edge of the bed, sitting up. She's wearing a long flannel that smells faintly like metal. Vaclav's, then.

The headache sharpens as she sits up, pounding in time with her heartbeat, she thinks. She wants to lay back down and pass out for another year, but her stomach rumbles, and she's pretty sure the last time she ate was….a sandwich in Poland.

She notices with surprise that her leg has a dark slash through it. Remembers now that she looks that it was broken, but it seems to be mostly working now. A few dark cables strung through the slice as a patch job, but it works wonders for something so hurried.

A soft exhale, and she stands up.

Ah. She'd forgotten about. Well, everything besides the headache. Her side hurts, and the gasp that's drawn from her at that pain makes her ribs hurt.

Food first. Bed forever second. Maybe a trip to the bathroom in between. She'd suffered worse pains, flew with worse. This was nothing.

Malik walks out into the hallway, turns for the kitchen. Notices a chair out of the corner of her eye that hadn't been in the hallway the last time she'd been here-

And promptly trips over it, her right foot catching just under the edge of it, because-

The person in the chair – there was a person in the chair, Adam, she recognizes now – stands swiftly to catch her, dark arms wrapping gently over hers, stopping her fall before it ever really starts.

Malik almost blames the fall on her patched aug leg. She'd forgotten that 'out of the corner of her eye' did not mean 'out of tripping range of her right side'.

"You okay?" he asks, steadying her back upright, hands light and gentle. Almost cautious.

"Toe hurts like a bitch," she grumbles, glaring down at the offending thing.

The assassin makes some choked noise of surprise, halfway to amusement but stalling hard before it gets there. "That's what you're going to complain about?"

"Yeah, fuck," she'd bend over and reach for it to try and ease the pain if she didn't know that would give her hell in the form of ribs and side. Priorities. "Bitch." A little quieter.

He's staring at her in what she thinks must be awe, because his hands are still on her. Maybe he's afraid she's going to fall again.

She's about to say something when her stomach rumbles again, a quiet sound, but the sudden twist in his expression tells her he heard it.

"Please tell me there's something to eat here," she just says. Slowly, almost unwillingly moving out of his light touch, moving for the kitchen again.

"Can't promise anything." His voice is…stiff, and she wonders why that is. Not able to think around the headache enough to try and put pieces together.

"Knowing Vaclav, all he has is instant ramen." Not exactly the most appetizing thing on an empty post-procedure stomach, but it was better than nothing. The other option was whatever whiskey Adam had left behind when he had been here a year ago. Neither she nor Vaclav were huge on the scotch, and she hadn't felt right drinking what was his.

She moves into the kitchen, glancing around. The curtains are pulled here too, and there's a low kitchen light on by the island. Flicking the television on as she passes, she hears Eliza Cassan's infuriatingly flat, calm voice in the face of the horror she's discussing.

Malik has her head in the fridge, contemplating just how old the box of takeout is in there – soggy, a slight stain at the bottom of the plastic, and she half expects there to be mold in it if she opened it – when the news anchor mentions an explosion at Panchaea, the world's most recent attempt to mitigate climate change. She pulls her head out, closes the mostly-empty fridge, and glances at the screen. The loss of this billions of dollars project isn't felt quite so sharply, considering the loss in lives, augmented and natural – of which there appears to be a rough count in the corner of the screen-

Millions.

Millions dead in what was apparently a single night. Malik swallows tight, moves to the screen to get better view. She doesn't notice Adam walking out of the hallway, his hip leaning against the doorframe, not quite paying attention to the quiet drone of Picus News.

He goes rigid when he hears the topic of the hour, of, likely, all the hours lately. Eliza has nothing of note to explain why almost every (but clearly not every single) aug lost control and went on a murderous rampage. There's footage, and Malik would be shocked if she didn't clearly remember, if likely every person on the planet didn't remember.

She wonders how many augs are left. How many more there will be now. If anyone injured in the attacks will want to get augmented, considering.

"At least it's over," she says, flicking the screen off. The sound wasn't helping her headache, and she wasn't sure why she thought it was a good idea in the first place. She wonders how many contacts she'd lost. How many houses she knew of that were suddenly empty.

She wonders why she'd been spared.

Maybe Vaclav has an idea. Though if she could guess, he was sleeping – finally crashed after too long awake. Otherwise she'd hear the sounds of tinkering coming from his side of the house. She doesn't remember much of what he and Pritchard had been saying in the chaos. The burn of gravel on her cheek, the sound of Adam's whining augs, the cold night above. Those are the things she remembers.

He doesn't say anything, and she wonders how much worse it is for him – sure, she lived the horror, but he was trapped by it. He couldn't do anything, couldn't fight it in anything more than will. Notices that he's not wearing his coat, nor his battle armor. He's left in just a sleeveless shirt, looking like the sort of thing she wore under her flightsuit. It has some kind of light debris flecked across it, and that's when she knows she's definitely fixating. Just reaches up and rubs at her eye and makes another attempt at finding something to eat.

"The kid sleeping?" she asks, ignoring how she'd caught herself wondering if that was the same shirt he'd held her into. If he hadn't changed since then. Though she supposes he might not have anything to change into, considering she was in Vaclav's shirt.

"Yeah," he answers, no longer looking comfortable against the doorframe but not moving either.

She'd almost hoped he was awake so she could take more painkillers, but considering she had no clue how long it had been and last time he'd told her she couldn't have more, she figured it was best to wait.

Her pounding head disagreed.

Fuck it. She digs in the cupboard first, reaches for sweet relief in the form of ibuprofen, and she takes it without even digging out a glass of water first. She does that next, chases the dry feeling in her throat. Sets the glass down and registers- looking back in the cupboard. Is that a breakfast bar in the medicine cabinet?

Small miracles. She digs in, ignoring the ache in her ribs as she stretches up for it, and pulls it out. Sealed and everything.

"Holy shit. One actual food item." A startled laugh- ow, and she tears into it. Heading back for her room, and almost doesn't notice the hurry in which Adam gets out of her way. She raises an eyebrow at him, and it takes her a moment to realize the effect is a bit lost with only one eyebrow to refer to. "Gonna sleep for another year." Her words are half-muffled by the bar in her mouth as she walks past him. "You should get some rest too."

He doesn't say anything to that either.

She'd thought about a stop to the bathroom, and while all she really wants is to sleep again, she begrudgingly goes for it. Feels a little better after she's brushed her teeth and washed what parts of her face she could reach and used the toilet.

It's so hard to resist the temptation to just flop onto the bed and pass out, but she manages that too. Sits gingerly, and lowers herself down, curling up under the blanket and the just-barely warm spot she'd left.

The door had closed sometime between when she'd gone into the bathroom and come back out, and she supposes Adam is still out there. Hopes that he'll at least sleep in the chair if he so refuses to do anything else.

The next time she wakes up she feels a lot more human and a lot less zombie. The daylight peeking through the edges of the curtains probably helps, too. She goes to the bathroom first this time, and realizes that while she had been right in that she was wearing Vaclav's shirt, she hadn't noticed that it was all she was wearing. It was long enough that it didn't matter, and far more comfortable than staying in her flightsuit, or, god forbid, wearing one of Vaclav's baggy abominations.

The gauze over her eye looks less white and a little more pink in the light, and she thinks it's due a change. Looks around for a kit in the bathroom, but the only first aid items she finds are all tiny gauze pads, for what she presumes must be papercuts only.

Malik sighs, and heads for the door. Expects to see Adam in the chair again, maybe even sleeping.

No such luck. He is doing something though – pulling a knife in slow measured movements against. A block of wood?

"Wouldn't have pegged you for the type to be into woodcarving," she says softly, curiously. That explains the shavings on his shirt yesterday – earlier today? Whatever.

His hand abruptly stills, almost cutting too deep and just managing to finish the shave off before quickly flipping the knife closed and sliding it into a pocket. The chunk of wood goes into another pocket, and just as suddenly as she'd seen it, he's back to his unflappable self.

He must be tired, to not have noticed her waking up. Makes her think he hasn't slept at all. She wonders if he has augs that keep him running longer, keep him alert and awake long past what she could do. Maybe the Sentinel is capable of that, and more alloy parts than organic should certainly help.

Somehow she gets the feeling that wouldn't be a welcome question to ask him.

"Thought I told you to get some sleep," she says instead, when she sees he's not going to make any note on the woodworking.

"Was that an order?" There's some kind of bite in the back of his words, and she wonders for a moment if this is a dream.

Or, more likely, what she remembers in Vaclav's workshop is the dream and this is the same old Icarus she's known.

"Apparently it should have been." A small smile, like she doesn't notice the cold curl of distance in his tone.

Malik's moving past him for the kitchen, yawning into her hand as she goes. If last meal's breakfast bar was a miracle, she doesn't expect she'll find anything else here to eat. Not even a single egg.

She'll kick Vaclav's ass for not taking better care of himself. As soon as he gets up.

The mechanic himself interrupts the thought, padding into the kitchen and yawning loud. He almost doesn't notice her, until he gently brushes past her hip and then his eyes are wide open.

"Mal! How are you feeling?" Hands on her waist and turning her slow so he can get a look at her, though she doesn't know if he's more interested in her remaining eye or her injury.

"Could be better. Could be worse." Could be a lot worse.

"You can't wear a guy's shirt and tell him that's how you're doing, babe," the nickname saccharine sweet, and he keeps a straight face for all of one instant before he's laughing.

She snorts, and then whacks his arm as the amusement shoves pain through her ribs. "Stop that. No funny shit while it hurts me to laugh."

He holds his hands up in surrender, though he still looks amused. And exhausted. The bags under his eyes don't escape her.

"If you came in here to only make coffee and not anything to eat, so help me-"

"Woah there, mom, I came to eat something too, I promise!"

"And what, in this kitchen full of food, were you going to eat?" She quirks an eyebrow at him and- damn, still not capable of doing that expression.

"My takeout," he almost whines.

She huffs an exasperated breath, but steps aside so he can get to the fridge. She starts a pot of coffee for him in return.

"You up for fixing Jensen's arm today? I took some pain relievers when I last woke up, so I'm off the table for the moment," she says. Quiet enough to maybe go unheard over the sounds of the coffee machine starting up.

Vaclav looks at her sharply as he pulls the soggy box out of the fridge, pausing a moment. "Yeah, don't see why not. You brought me enough parts to be able to patch you two for sure." He scratches at his chin, and Malik is very aware that those eyes are far too calculating for the overeager child he always pretends to be.

She'd seen this in him when she first met him. She wonders if Adam recognizes it too.

"You know," Vaclav says casually, as he pops the box into the microwave and sets the timer, "Jensen called Pritchard after we got him back."

"What." She must have heard wrong. Pritchard had claimed, frustrated, furious, that he couldn't find anything on Icarus.

She'd never referred to him by his first name because she assumed the assassin didn't want anyone else knowing his identity. She'd kept Pritchard's name from her lips too.

She hears footsteps, turns quickly- ow, and is immediately asking, "You know Francis Pritchard?"

Adam, to his credit, looks as surprised as she feels to hear that name. "I…yes. Wait."

She does.

"Ah." He seems to have put something together, if the long-suffering expression over his shades is anything to go by. "Koller and Pritchard were on a call when I patched in." She doesn't know if he's explaining to himself or to her.

She's pissed anyway. "That little fuck. He's lucky he's an ocean away and I don't have a bird or I'd go skin him myself."

"What?" Vaclav looks startled, a little confused. Like maybe he doesn't know what he's just started.

"Two years ago, I asked him to find out anything he could for me about Icarus. He told me there was nothing to be found." A sharp glance at Adam.

"That was true." A pause, and then an almost pained smirk tugging at the corner of his lips. "Because he's the one who erased it all."

"Ohh, he's so dead."

"He told me the Phoenix was a white male, age 34, from Arizona," the assassin supplies. She would be amused, and for a moment she thinks that he'd just been playing by both of their rules in hiding them from each other.

The moment passes, and the thought goes with it.

She turns on her infolink, opens a channel with Adam, and dials Pritchard immediately.

Vaclav perches on the counter, filling a mug with coffee and shoving a fork into his lightly-steaming week-old meal.

It's early evening in the states, probably, and the hacker should be awake. He picks up.

"Mal. You still alive?" He almost sounds concerned. Cute.

"When were you going to tell me you knew Adam Jensen and that he was Icarus?" she's crossing her arms, even though he can't see it.

"Malik-"

"Or me that you knew the Phoenix was Faridah Malik, and not the Arizonian you sent me on a goose chase for?" Adam's rumble sounds far more threatening than her voice, and she wonders if that's a sore spot for him.

"Listen," he almost sounds like he's about to laugh but thinks better of it. "This is exactly why. If I'd told either of you, the other would have come and killed me without a second thought. Client confidentiality is why the both of you worked with me-"

"And you kept the secret to yourself after we started working together to what, have a laugh?" she glances at Adam, and the curved eyebrow peeking over a shade mirrors exactly how she feels.

"Wh-"

She and Adam let him stew in the silence for as long as he needs.

"Listen, I just got done saving the world, and your asses, so if you'd cut me a little slack for sticking to my own rules, I would appreciate that, thank you."

The world? She knew Pritchard had a big ego, but still. "Pritchard-"

"Sorry, who the fuck do you think convinced the President to send missiles on the broadcast station for that insanity-signal?" He snaps, and sounds a little more like the Pritchard she's used to knowing.

"And you didn't stamp your handle all over it? Who are you and what have you done with Pritchard?"

"Ha, ha, very funny. Now, since you don't have anything nice to say, like, perhaps, 'Thank you Pritchard', kindly fuck off."

He hangs up on them.

Malik bursts out laughing, immediately groaning as a hand flies to her side like she can hold her ribs together and make them stop hurting.

"Well, at least Pritchard's doing alright." She sends him an email anyway, just a little 'thank you, asshole' just to make sure he isn't too upset. She'd hate to lose the last thirteen cents in her bank.

"Arizona, huh?" Vaclav asks, stuffing his mouth with a too-large forkful of food. Looking her up and down like that was the last state he'd expected her to be from, and she just looks at him because, no thank you, enough laughing for now.

"Land of the blazing sun, or something." She glances at Adam, who seems to have withdrawn back into himself now that the call is over. "Well, since you're now consuming the last debatably edible thing in this house, someone's going to have to go grocery shopping." She's pouring herself a coffee, and already thinking.

Of the three of them, she's the one who can pass for a natural the most. If she leaves the bloody bandage over her eye, it'll better help sell that she was injured in the Incident. She can limp on her malfunctioning leg – as long as she gets pants for it – and the ribs she doesn't have to fake. Any overly aggressive police officers she ran into should think she was just another natural trying to get back to her life. Hopefully.

Adam and Vaclav both immediately frown at her, like they can see what she's thinking. "Too dangerous," is the assassin's gruff response.

"I would like to eat something that qualifies as food, and I'm fairly certain no one is delivering a day after the Incident."

"Two," Vaclav interjects.

This seems to give Adam more backing for his argument that this was a bad idea.

"Two, whatever." She crosses her arms – carefully, making sure not to put pressure on her aching ribs.

"I'll go." The assassin sounds long-suffering, like he's been given an unpleasant job by a superior, and….she supposes that is kind of what it sounds like.

"No," she starts, "And not you either," immediately looking at Vaclav as he opened his mouth to offer. "Sorry, Mr.'s Augmented-Sunglasses and I-Put-A-Skullplate-In-My-Own-Head-For-Shits-And-Giggles, but neither of you can pass for naturals." She says this with a lilt of fondness, for the both of them. "And in a place like Prague, where no one ever liked us in the first place, I don't imagine the cops will do anything but shoot first and drink later when they see an aug."

"All the more reason you shouldn't go either." He sounds firm on this. And like he plans on fighting her on it.

He could easily drag her back to her room if he was so adamant. She might have to be a little more tactful in her planning.

She raises her hands in surrender. "Alright, alright. I'll see if there's anyone around who's willing to….I guess dead drop some groceries nearby." Reaching down for her coffee and taking a drink. Hoping Vaclav is eager enough to work on Adam once he's finished his breakfast.

Which, judging by the sounds of cardboard on plastic, he's throwing away the box now. Refilling his coffee, and waving the assassin over. "C'mon, Jensen, let me fix your arm while I'm awake and refreshed." A wink over his shoulder, and Malik would almost think he was flirting.

The assassin doesn't move for a moment, watching her. He's entirely too observant. What makes him think she'll go out without wearing pants, anyway? She tops off her coffee and moves to follow Vaclav, raising her eyebrow at him. He seems to give in, stepping forward and across the living room and towards the workshop.

Vaclav is already all over the place, his coffee perching precariously close to the edge of a work table as he's sifting through augmentation parts – he must have upended the crate while she'd been sleeping – and digging for what he thinks he might need. She pushes the mug a little further away from the edge even as the assassin moves for the chair.

"Listen, Jensen, I'm gonna have to put you under and run some system diagnostics. The way Pritchard and I got you out wasn't…exactly the most orthodox, and I'd like to make sure everything's still working like it should under there." Vaclav sounds uncertain, his hands hovering over Adam's shoulders, not quite touching as he speaks.

"Diagnostics, that's it?" The assassin asks.

"Yes- well. Unless I find something. Then I'll fix it, you know." As if Vaclav could ever let a problem before him exist without an attempt at solving it.

Adam considers this for a moment. Malik gets the feeling he's looking over at her in the doorway, though for what reason, she has no idea.

"Fine." It's quiet, but Vaclav is immediately moving to put him under. He could fix the arm easily while he was out too.

Once his breathing has evened out on the monitor to the side, and she waits a few more minutes to make sure he's really out, she sighs. "I don't think he's slept," she just says.

Vaclav doesn't look at her, digging into his arm and reaching for the bullet she'd lodged into it. He hums.

"I'm gonna go get some food while he's out. Let him rest a bit, yeah?"

Vaclav raises an eyebrow aimed at the metal arm, but she knows clearly it's meant for her. "Sly fox, you are," he just says, with a soft smirk.

"You know me," she says airily, leaving the room and going to find herself some actual clothes. She's pretty sure she'd left something here before, considering this was her favorite safehouse, containing her favorite mechanic.

She's right. She finds a pair of jeans, a long sleeve shirt, and a jacket with a fur-lined hood. All that should do. Luckily her neural implant was covered with the strip of tape holding the gauze over her eye, too. Small mercies.

Malik gets dressed, toes her boots on, and grabs a few shopping bags. Heads for the door, locking it behind her and walking out into a world irrevocably changed by the Incident. Nothing would be the same, and she'd have to find out what her place was in it. Later.

Food first.

The air is crisp, a faint taste of smoke drifting through the air, sharp and mirroring all the shattered windows of all the buildings she passes. Scratches in walls. Blood. Bodies.

She's seen worse, but not so much of it at once. Cassan had said millions. Of course there would be bodies in the streets, cars crashed and still smoldering, embers floating out of apartments. She shouldn't be surprised.

She is, regardless.

It's a couple blocks before she even sees anyone. A police car at the end of the street is the first sign of life outside of her house she's encountered. She doesn't act up the pain, but just lets through what she's actually feeling on dulling painkillers. It hurts to breathe deep, it hurts to twist, and her eye is a constant pounding.

She's not so surprised when a police officer gets out of the squad car and comes over to talk to her.

She is surprised that he immediately thinks she's a natural.

"Ma'am, what are you doing outside?" he asks, hands on an automatic rifle strapped to his chest.

"Ran out of food," she answers. "I'd hoped I'd make it a little longer, but I procrastinated my grocery shopping before…" trails off meaningfully.

He takes the hint easily enough. "I'm sorry to hear that. You should be careful out here by yourself. You never know if it's really over and they'll go crazy again."

She is very careful to bite her tongue at that. "Yes, you're right. I'll be quick, thank you, officer."

He lets her pass, and she's silently grateful. Refuses to think it was almost too easy.

The supermarket she gets to, a small corner store with the basic needs a household might have, has the lights off and its doors closed. The glass in the door is shattered though, and she thinks she'd rather not walk any farther, if she was being quite honest with herself.

She steps through the shattered frame of the door, and commences her errand. A few packets of pasta. Eggs. Milk – she opened it to make sure it hadn't gone bad and that the refrigerators were still working. The few remaining vegetables that looked edible, and some frozen meat that had just begun thawing. Enough to last for at least a few days.

Malik leaves a credit chip on the counter on her way out.

The cop that had been on the corner is gone when she makes her way back, arms laden with heavy grocery bags- she'd forgotten how far it was she'd walked on the way over. Still, she wasn't exactly eager to make the trip back so soon, anyway.

She gets the distinct feeling that she's being watched. Doesn't quite know where it comes from though, which certainly makes it a useless feeling.

As she's nearing the house, she hears a strange sound behind her. Something like the rustling wind, but she hadn't felt an answering breeze in her hair or on her face, and she whirls to face it. Sees…Adam? Just as he's about to duck into an alley.

"Jensen?" she asks, incredulously. Hands full of bags. "Are you playing spyboy on me?"

To his credit, he'd stopped trying to make it into the alley once he'd been seen. She'd almost think he looked sheepish. At least his arm looks fixed.

"What am I, a poor natural woman, to do? Being followed by an aug, invisibly, no less." Grinning and holding up one armful of bags so he can at least help carry them, if he's so assed on following her. As if what she'd seen walking there and back hadn't even gotten to her. Why should it? She'd been close to the stink of death before, had seen gore and blood and meat in her own leg shot off. Perhaps it was the knowledge that this had been done by innocents, against their will.

"I told you it was too dangerous," he says, suddenly beside her and close to her ear. He sounds worried, but maybe that's just the anger she hears curling in his throat.

"It was fine. The only police officer I saw thought I was a natural. Naturally."

She'd hoped to elicit at least some sound out of him for that, but he rewards her with stone-cold silence.

Fine.

At least he'd taken the bags in her left hand, letting her redistribute the heavy load in her right to both.

"So your arm's all good? Systems too?" She wonders why he'd gotten up so fast. Had the fix to his arm been so simple? If she'd had her way, he'd have been out and sleeping for at least another hour.

He says nothing, but extends the nanoblade in that arm. She wonders if he's trying to push her away. Wonders why he might be doing that. Any other day, she'd push back, step closer. Right now, she just wants to eat and get some painkillers and sit down for the next ten hours.

She can feel that headache coming back.

"Glad to see it," she just says, as they get back home." You want some real breakfast, then?"


	19. Shatter

Malik makes eggs and sausage bits, and immediately scarfs down her own portion. Adam barely touches his, though he at least makes an attempt at thanking her for the food. Not a good one, but it's the thought that counts.

She takes a plate of it to Vaclav too, certain that he'll be hungry and by the time he even notices the food it'll be a few hours later anyway.

"Hey kid, brought you something to eat."

He doesn't look up from his tinkering, and she steps closer to see what he's working on. Oddly enough, it looks like a neural chip.

"Is that what I think it is?" she asks, setting the plate to the side of his arm where he won't knock it off the table – yes, this was a pattern that she had learned to get used to adjusting for – and leaning over the work surface.

"Neural chip, yes. Vaclav Koller brand. Immune to hacking of any kind, except perhaps my own." A sly grin, and that much of an answer while he's this focused means he's been waiting to tell her. "Your assassin can't sleep. I don't blame him. But if he wants, I'm happy to give him a chip like the three of us have, that can't be taken over by a fuckin' _broadcast frequency_." The tight line of his lips tells her he's far more furious about this than he acts. That augs as a whole were so easily abused.

"I think he'll appreciate that. Don't forget to get some rest, though, too." Her tone edges toward chiding, and he raises a hand to wave her off.

"Sleep is for the weak, _mom_."

"Well, I'm going to go be weak then. Eat that before it gets moldy, thanks." She has a feeling that as soon as she's gone his brain will fully register the plate of warm, home-cooked food and be unable to resist.

Adam is still in the kitchen when she passes, working on his food. She has a feeling he normally doesn't take his time with food. She doesn't usually, either. Just gives him a tired wave as she makes for her room.

Malik makes good on her plan, getting all her clothes off with the least amount of pain possible and pulling Vaclav's loose and soft shirt back on, curling under the blankets and feeling. Bone-tired and aching.

Sleep comes easy.

Waking comes in agony.

There's a fire in her leg and Malik's eye snaps open with a groan-turned-shout, voice hoarse as she curls hard, barely noticing the pain in her ribs as she does so. She's still half asleep and far, far too awake.

Everything is chased away in the blinding, shaking clatter of pain. What feels like a stake in her head pounds hard, like someone is driving it in with a hammer, beat after beat. She doesn't know if she should dig her hands into her leg, just above where the flesh of it ends, or into her forehead. Feels dizzy and nauseous and she's not even moving, she doesn't think-

The door slams open and she barely registers that, eye trained on how her aug leg shakes and twitches, how everything feels too sharp and-

"Malik-" hands, cold and metal, grip her arms, shifting her. Pulling covers away and trying to see what's hurt her. " _Faridah_ -"

She moans at the movement, but it's enough to dislodge one of her hands from her leg and bury it into her forehead instead. Maybe if that stopped driving a damn nail into her brain the other pain would stop too.

" _Koller_!" Louder now, and if everything else didn't hurt so damn much she thinks that might have added to the pain. As it is, she's pretty sure it can't get any worse.

There's a distant clatter, a jumble of noise getting closer, and the mechanic careens into the room, clearly startled by the assassin calling for him, and apparently already awake. "What-"

"You said your chips couldn't be hacked, that this couldn't happen. You have to override it." Firm, furious.

"That's not- ohhh fuck. _Fuck_!" Vaclav pivots and runs.

"Koller-!" The hands leave her for a second, and some noise must make it past her lips – she'd been trying hard to keep them down, to focus on the pressure of her hands and not make any noise – because they come back suddenly. Cool and unyielding, and the sweet relief lasts barely a heartbeat at all.

Each inhale she takes is too deep, she can feel it in the ache that grows sharp with every breath drawn, but none of them have enough oxygen, enough anything.

Vaclav is running back a moment later, calling "hold her down flat-" as he slides through the doorway on one socked foot, almost eating shit into the wall.

The hands turn her, and she makes some noise of complaint, some desperate ' _pleasedon'tmoveme_ ' even though words won't come through the haze of it all.

Vaclav is suddenly leaning over her, his hand gently, hurriedly turning her chin to the side and pressing something against her throat. It pricks sudden, and she wonders distantly why _this_ is a pain she notices, as he depresses the plunger and something cold sinks in. "Firebird why didn't you tell me you _know I have this stuff_ -" he's saying as he injects, pulling the needle away immediately and throwing it over his shoulder. Both hands on her face, now, turning her eye to look at him.

She feels like she's gotten her lungs back, and then, slowly, her leg. Her head comes last, and she lets out a shaky exhale when it does, when the pain sets in to a duller ache. Carefully, cautiously uncurling from the tight ball she'd found herself in.

And realizes the two men are looming over her – though Adam a few steps further back – watching.

"Fuuck, Mal. How many days has it been since your last nupoz dose?"

Oh. Huh.

Shit.

"w's supposed to-" her voice cracks, dry in her throat and stuck. "night before the Incident." How long had it been since? Four days, five? Nearly two weeks without neuropozyne, and it was no wonder. She'd never gone so long before.

She slumps, wrung out and sweat-soaked from the adrenaline and all her old aches make a home in her again, no longer chased out by something worse. Groans, closing her eye and throwing an arm over her face.

The darkness is punctuated by the sound of quiet footsteps away. She lifts her arm, opens her eye a bit, but Vaclav is still there.

Ah.

"I need a shower," she manages. She certainly wouldn't be falling asleep like this. She can't remember the last time she had one, and the fact that this is only just now being realized tells her more than enough.

"I'll have to re-wrap your ribs and find you something waterproof for your side, hang on-" Vaclav leaves her bedside, moving for the main bathroom in the apartment. Malik works on sitting up, her hand shooting to her side and she glances down- the bandage is spotting red. She might have torn her stitches just then. Oops.

She sighs, hears quiet murmuring in the hall outside. Vaclav's voice saying "heyy, it's fine. I meant it," she has to strain to hear the next bit, and even then she's not sure she hears correctly. "Like I said, they're unhackable. Got one for you too, if you want it." There's no answer, not an audible one, anyway.

Vaclav is back just as quickly, and she hasn't even gotten herself off the bed yet. Step one, then two. If she thinks of the shower as step one she'll never get there. First, feet on the ground. Second, stand. Above all else, the Phoenix persevered.

Even when the unobtainable goal is just a shower.

The mechanic keeps his hands off her, but follows a step behind, ready to catch her if she should need it. She at least manages that much. Gets to the bathroom and sets to peeling the flannel off, undoing button by button. Rolling her neck, noticing in the mirror the small bead of blood at the injection site.

Vaclav steps in behind her, closing the door most of the way. If she wasn't sure he was into augs and guys – and mainly augs on guys – she might have been worried, but she knows Vaclav better than that.

He makes some displeased noise when she finally pulls off the shirt, and she glances in the mirror, sees his gaze caught on her side. "You just had to tear your stitches too, didn't you?"

She at least has the grace to look sheepish. "I don't do anything by halves, you know."

"I'll fix that after you shower." He sounds tired, and she's willing to bet he hasn't gotten any rest since she last saw him.

"You sure? I think I could…not make it worse by morning."

The look he gives her makes her think he's been taking notes from her and practicing.

"Alright, alright. Bring on the needle. I'm just gonna get clean first." She takes the waterproof covering from him, plastering it to her side and taping it down with the medical tape he hands her. "Shoo."

Vaclav holds his hands up in surrender and goes. She starts the water and unwraps her chest while it warms up. Glances at herself in the mirror and winces. Her chest is a bruised mess, mottled purple. She'd almost think it looks worse than it feels, but it definitely feels that bad, especially with the deep, pained breaths she'd been taking earlier.

Her eye is drawn again to the bloody spot on her neck and she leans in close suddenly. Notices a faint outline, red and just the lightest tinge of bruise that is….vaguely in the shape of a hand.

Right, that had happened.

She gingerly puts her hand over the mark, lining her fingers up with the points where his had been. Notes the difference in size between her hand and his, the length of his fingers, the width of his palm. Almost catches herself wondering if this was the only way she'd know how his hand compared to hers.

Shuts that down before it could go anywhere. If anyone had ever sent clearer signals they weren't interested, she hadn't seen them. Adam was making it pretty damn clear he didn't want to be any sort of…well, anything, with her. She wonders why he's still here, if that's the case. He was very obviously not being paid what his time was worth to be working for someone he could barely stand.

Steam starts to float out from the shower, and she pulls her hand from her throat, turns away from the mirror and all the revelations it held, and steps into the shower.

The sound that slips from her lips when the warm water hits her shoulders is loud and definitely obscene.

It feels like _heaven_.

Vaclav patches her up and gives her a sleepy wave as he heads back to his workshop, or, hopefully, his room. Malik feels better after that shower than she has since before she left on that godforsaken raid, and that's really quite unfortunate, isn't it?

She might get some nice sleep now, though. Something very important would have to be happening for her to get up at any reasonable hour, she decides then and there.

Bed forever. Now.

She stretches out a little more this time, faintly aware of how tight her muscles still feel from curling so hard around herself. Too sudden and sharp and she would kill for a massage. If it didn't hurt to move she'd knead herself out.

It'll have to wait, she supposes, eyes closed and already drifting.

True to her plan, she doesn't wake until late the next afternoon. That probably says something for just how much she'd run herself ragged, when her trained pilot-schedule failed her and she slept a whole nine hours later.

She gets up slowly, carefully, making sure not to pull anything unduly. Finds a pair of shorts this time, and goes to wash her face. Well, half of her face. She's reminded then that she needs to change the wrapping on her eye. Wonders if she wants to see it. She can just ask Vaclav to do it, but.

That feels too much like running away.

She pulls at the tape, unsticking it from itself and unwrapping it from around her head. A soft exhale, bracing herself. She doesn't actually know what she's going to find, here. Vaclav hadn't said anything besides waiting for it to heal before actually putting the eye in. Something about pressure and a moving eyeball would only exacerbate healing injuries.

Malik finds herself closing her eye as she pulls the gauze off – her hand was in the way, of course – and takes another slow breath. Opens her eye and looks into the mirror.

The gaping space where an eye should be is jarring, and she finds her breath catching in her throat on its way out. Alloy struts and a plate shine through under the red angry skin. A bundle of alloy cabling sticks out of her eye like it had been stabbed in. Consciously, she knows that it's just the connector for where her eye will go. Subconsciously, she immediately thinks it's the reason she lost her eye, that it had been stabbed in.

Breathe in and out. This was temporary. She'd have an eye again soon, despite everything else in the world. The Phoenix could always find an aug when she needed it. And she already had it. It would be that same grey-gold Icarus had, and she wonders what the contrast will look like next to her natural brown one.

She wonders how much will heal, and how much alloy will peek out around her eye, struts and supports and everything Vaclav had had to put in on the fly.

She really owes the kid some kind of apology – this is two traumatic augmentation surgeries she's shoved on him in a short period, and even though this one was better in that she wasn't outright dying, it still can't have been pleasant. He had it hard enough without one of his few friends – she knew, no matter how he tried to hide it and pretend he was fine – up and almost dying on him. Putting her life in his hands.

Malik sighs soft, digs into the kit Vaclav had left last night and pulls out new tape and a few gauze pads to wipe down with. Wets one and gently pushes against the injury, cleaning soft and hissing through her teeth at the prodding burn.

Lets it air dry for a bit. Staring into it, contemplating.

Really, if she thought about it, she'd gotten fucking lucky. She should be dead. A millisecond sooner, the slightest hesitation in her reaction, Adam not fighting the control as hard, any single one of those would have ended with her brains on the street.

Instead, all she lost was an eye.

Not so bad, when she put it that way.

When it's dry enough, she puts a clean gauze pad over it, tapes it on, and realizes she probably could have brushed her teeth while she was waiting for it to dry. Sets to rectifying that, before going out to go find some kind of breakfast.

There's no one in the hallway, or the kitchen, and the door to Adam's room was open. Nothing there, either.

Malik wonders if she should worry.

"Vaclav?" she calls softly, heading towards his side of the house, hoping to find him in bed. He's not, of course, hunched over the chair in his workshop, and he doesn't look up when she walks in.

Because he has Icarus on the chair, and is in the process of cutting into his forehead.

"What are you doing?" she asks, stepping closer. It was fifty-fifty on whether he'd answer, like this. Either he'd start unconsciously rambling to her to help himself focus, or he wouldn't even notice she had come in, even hours later.

Today is the latter flavor, it seems, as he hunches over and reaches in with a pair of forceps, pulling up- ah, his old biochip. She sees the new one on the side table, then. So Vaclav had managed to convince Adam to get one of his own upgrades. That was a feat on its own – most didn't trust non-branded tech, and she'd assumed Adam was one who liked that even less than others.

The procedure would take a while longer, and hopefully Vaclav would make Adam sleep longer yet, so she leaves him to it and wanders back to the kitchen. Starts a pot of coffee so she can take a mug to the kid while he made sure everything worked – neural implants were serious business, and even more so on a patient who had as many augs as Adam did. The mechanic could use any energy boost he could get his hands on, she was sure of that.

Malik brings him the cup of coffee before fixing herself food, and only goes to see how the implantation is going after her stomach is no longer reminding her of its existence, loudly and insistently.

By the time she goes back, Vaclav's done, cleaning up and gulping down the coffee she'd brought him far faster than anyone should drink anything. She just holds her coffee close, inhaling the warmth.

"How'd it go?" she asks, leaning against the doorframe.

"Perfectly fine, I think. Booted fine, and I'm getting readings on all his augs-" a low whistle, at that, scrolling through datasets. "And boy, does he have some nice ones all hidden in there. Everything's integrated alright, for the most part. A few things in there I need to patch for – I don't…recognize them?" his voice lilts high at that, in confusion.

Augs that even Vaclav hadn't seen? Color the Phoenix curious. She'd have to ask him sometime, though she'd bet that he'd need to be drunk before speaking at any sort of length about his augmentations.

"Good work on that. You made that chip even faster than you made mine. You're getting better at it." A small smile at the corner of her lips. The kid was a genius, and he deserved to be told so by someone who wasn't actively trying to get something from him.

"You flatter. If I didn't know you, I'd say you were trying to get an eye out of me." He grins crookedly at her over his tablet, and that's exactly the reason she'd said anything at all.

"Nah, no eye. Eyepatch though?" she says this over the lip of her own coffee mug, and Vaclav is actually surprised enough to look up from his work.

"What, you lost a leg and then an eye and figured you'd go all-in on the pirate theme?" he asks, incredulously.

"Yeah, why not?" she laughs, soft. "Make it see-through on my end and I'll be one real badass pirate pilot. I already steal for a living, anyway," she adds, drinking to stop herself from laughing. No laughing if she could help it, her ribs remind her.

"I'll see what I can do for you, _Madame Phoenix_ ," he finally says. He looks lighter, then, a little less exhausted. Good.

"Only on the condition that you get some sleep," she threatens.

"Can't leave a patient to wake up on their own," Vaclav fires back, as if that's the only reason he hasn't slept yet.

Malik almost quirks her eyebrow at him, but catches herself this time. She might need to evaluate just how much she relied on that expression to cow Vaclav.

Or she could just ignore it and wait to get her eye back. No big deal, and then she could go back to terrorizing Vaclav with that disbelieving look all she liked.

"If you say so." A small smile. "There's food in the fridge if you're hungry." She turns to leave, thinks a little reading might do her some good. Maybe sit in the window, and if she was feeling really extravagant, open the blinds to get a look outside. Icarus might yell at her later for it, but she might not even care.

Malik refills her coffee in the kitchen, grabs whatever book she'd been reading the last time she was here and had abandoned by the couch, and curls up in the window seat to read.

She feels hands on her, shifting her, makes some noise of complaint. There's an answering hush, and the hands on her feel enough like home that she doesn't bother rousing the energy to protest, to fight. She registers soft footsteps for a short while before she's set down, and something is pulled over her. Warmer, then, her feet curling up to get some warmth back, and she drifts again.

She dreams of falling, of fire and slamming impacts loud and agonizing. Of running and heat licking from explosions from flames. Of Icarus, his chest torn open and instead of the sentinel missing it's his entire _heart_ -

Malik wakes with a choked " _Adam_ -" her hand instinctively reaching out and snapping closed over…an arm.

Her eye is open but it takes her a second to register that she's caught _his_ arm, and his shades aren't on and he looks as startled as she feels. She wonders what he's doing here, and her gaze follows his hand to the nightstand, where he'd just set down a piece of paper, carefully unfolded.

The gears in her brain slam to a halt right there, because if there was any paper she'd ever recognize on sight, it's _this one_.

She recoils as if burned, immediately letting go of him and drawing back, tearing her eyes away from the contract he'd set down to look at him. To try and figure out what the _fuck_ this meant, because she was not awake nor here enough to parse it out on her own.

"I'm-" he starts.

"Leaving." She doesn't want to hear him say it. Something cold settles in her chest, deep and curling around her heart and it's suddenly a little harder to breathe.

Well. She supposes that answered the question of why he'd stuck around this long. He wanted Vaclav's neural implant, and he – maybe rightfully – thought she wouldn't let him have it if he didn't work for her. For him, she would've made an exception, she thinks.

"Tell me," she says, her voice soft, barely hoarse from just waking. "Is your name even Adam?"

He recoils this time, she notes with some small amount of satisfaction. Let him feel what she was feeling, then. If he even cared enough.

"What?" Like he can't even follow where she might have gotten that question.

She pushes herself upright, because she'd at least like to not be saying this laying down. She might even get to her feet.

"You know, at this point, I'm starting to be fairly sure that I've just hallucinated all those times you cared, at all, because you sure as _hell_ act like you don't when I'm anything close to lucid. I'm not even sure I know your name, because as it stands, it makes more sense that I just made one up for you while I was bleeding out and flying myself home and you just ran with it. So tell me." Ah, she has made it to her feet, stepping forward and into his space. Too close to the hell she'd woken up from to give a single fuck about what she's doing here, now that she's awake. "Is _your name_ even Adam?"

He's looking down at her in what could only be described as pained shock, but at least he has the decency to keep his shades off. She can see his jaw working as he swallows hard, as he seems to come to terms with something.

It feels like an eternity before he speaks.

"It is."

This almost confuses her more. It means she hasn't imagined all those times, that he told her his name, that he carried her gently and carefully out of a hell many didn't make it out of, that he had pulled her close and given her something to hold onto when she'd woken up mid-procedure. And at the same time, he'd turned around and acted like her very existence had been an annoyance, the epitome of an insufferable client he couldn't wait to be rid of.

She can't reconcile the two.

"So go." Those two words hurt worse than getting her leg shotgunned off had. "If you're sick of me, or you want nothing to do with me, _leave_. If you'd rather be doing other work, fine." She takes a deep breath despite the ache in her ribs, despite the knowledge that their contract had _said_ he could do other work whenever he pleased, and does her best to keep her voice steady. "But if this is about my eye-"

The way he stills tells her more than words ever could.

She is furious, suddenly. Her hands fist in the edges of his coat, and she pulls him down sharply so that he is eye to eye with her.

"Then don't _fucking_ run from it. I'm not some goddamn fragile fucking flower who's going to crumble and _wilt_ from a single bullet." She is certain that her remaining eye is alight with fury, any traces of sleep long gone. "It'll take _far more_ than your half-assed attempt to kill _me_ , and every time I get hurt I come back stronger, as a _Phoenix_ is fucking _meant to_."

He almost looks afraid of her.

Good.

"We've already been through this fucking song and dance before. I blamed myself for your Sentinel."

He opens his mouth, like he's going to say something. She doesn't let him.

"Enough. Enough running." It hadn't worked the last time. He'd come back, and she doesn't want to know how much more time it would take for that to happen again. It wasn't worth it. Not the last time, and not this time either.

He's looking at her in some mixture of awe and guilt- is that guilt? This is the longest she's ever had the luxury of looking into his eyes, and at any other moment she'd take advantage of it and burn them into her memory. As it stands now, she just wants him to get the _message_.

"Okay."

That's all he says, but his hands raise slowly, move for hers. She thinks he's about to pull her hands off his coat, but all he does is cover them. Carefully, gently, he untangles her fingers from the fabric and just. Holds them.

"Okay."


End file.
